


All Strings Attached

by renaissancepalette



Series: The Spideychelle CEO AU [1]
Category: Spider-Man (Tom Holland Movies), Spider-Man - All Media Types, The Amazing Spider-Man (Movies - Webb)
Genre: Adult Peter Parker, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Boss/Employee Relationship, CEO, CEO Michelle Jones, Deception, Developing Relationship, F/M, Fake Marriage, Fake/Pretend Relationship, Felicia and Michelle used to be friends, Forbidden Love, Mentioned Miles Morales, Prompt Fic, Romance, Secret Relationship, added TASM because of some shared characters and back history, not so much anymore
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-09-08
Updated: 2020-03-20
Packaged: 2020-10-11 12:40:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 15
Words: 45,370
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20546315
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/renaissancepalette/pseuds/renaissancepalette
Summary: [ AKA - The PeterMJ CEO AU; CEO!Michelle and Assistant!Peter ]In a world where Michelle has made a name for herself after inheriting a million-dollar company, beaten the odds, and actively uses the company to do good. She puts her best work and her best years into transforming the company into something her younger self would be proud of, and she’s worked too damn hard to come from the bottom to the top where she is now to let anyone tell her otherwise.Until an anonymous source leaks allegations of fraud happening behind her back and from within her company.Michelle knows what she wants and what she needs but that comes to a screeching halt with Peter Parker — especially when he gains the job as an undercover journalist under the guise of working as her personal assistant to solve who really causing her company to fall.But despite the planned and carefully assembled guises andthe lies, for things to becomepersonalwas the one thing no one ever, ever considered becoming a possibility. But then again, the best things are usually unplanned.





	1. Intro: the fateful meeting that started it all

**Author's Note:**

> **Chapters and story are driven by prompts sent to my Tumblr writing blog. These chapters are rearranged to be in timeline order.**  
  
Because it is a new year and after being asked I said "fuck it" and I'm posting these chapters here too.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the intro chapter which sets up and explains how the story begins. After this, the ball starts rolling more
> 
> additional note: I gave Michelle the last name Watson instead of the fan-given last name Jones because if she's supposed to be MJ, then make her MJ. Am I right?

> _Peter Benjamin Parker: bitten by a radioactive spider at fifteen, and for the last twelve years had been the number one and original Spider-Man._
> 
> He's accomplished lots of things in his reign as one of New York City's top superheroes: He became a trademark, a Popsicle, a cereal, and popular-selling plushie toys, cake decorations, face paint pattern. He's even had a small balloon in a Macy's Day Parade. He's saved the city over and over and over, made some alliances—with Matt Murdock, Johnny and Sue Storm, Pepper Potts—and he's lost some, such as Dr. Otto Octavius. Had fallen in love, fell out of love; fell in love again and she died. He'd gotten his dream job, lost it because his boss lost his mind to his invention; made some dicey money choices such as being rented out for birthday parties, and has broken the record of number of face-plants (due to his web-swinging); gained a catchy theme song and an apprentice who he's trained for the past five years and who is currently the city's new savior.
> 
> Now it's four more years later: after his hero mantle has been successfully taken, after he's finally created a career for himself and has been living a steady life as a reporter at the city's best non-conglomerate newspaper, The Bugle. His collection of super suits are folded in a box kept within a digital bulletproof safe hidden somewhere beneath the old wooden floorboards of his small apartment's kitchen. He's thankful that his landlord has never and very likely will never get the building completely renovated.
> 
> Every now and then, he checks the news via app or tunes in to the local television station to make sure the new Spider-Man is still doing well and holding his own. Only a small handful of times Peter has had to donne his suit again and swing over to help. But for those past four years he hasn't had to help and his confidence and comfort has grown towards the younger superhero.
> 
> Within Peter's new career as a reporter is where this takes place and he's about to make his biggest break—technically his second, after going undercover to report on the discrimination of employees at an enterprise. His debate with reporter Eddie Brock, before the latter's temporary blacklist, boosted Peter's credibility also. In between writing articles, Peter's also one of The Bugle's top photographers.
> 
> Now he's to be on his second career breaking assignment soon: to be an undercover employee to solve the acts of fraud at the company headed by Michelle J. Watson.

* * *

The printed headlines are annoyingly bold, brick-block lettering that take up a noticeable portion of the section-A front page news:

##  **CEDILL**: Under new management, corporation under fire for fraud allegations 

It isn't printed to take up much room—it luckily isn't even the main too on the front page—but its lettering is large enough. It's large enough that on the morning of, a purchased copy if the newspaper is slapped on the desk of the management's desk of Michelle J. Watson, the new CEO. She's only been in office for a few years, and she's rather confident that her predecessor hadn't intended for _this_ when Michelle inherited the leadership.

The CEO drains the last of her water bottle—Fiji, because she _had_ been having a _good_ day, a _productive_ morning—intakes the hardened, heated look of exasperation belonging to the employee before her, and she hurries to the nearest television—a flat screen on the opposite wall at the far end of her large office, quickly flips to the local news station and she waits, her employee at her side, filling her in about what he'd been told by the over-talkative newspaper stand clerk.

"He had been very boastful," she's told.

"Who was it?" Michelle asks. Arms crossed over her chest, she tries to mentally will away her rising panic. "Old guy? Gray hair? Wears a cap; rather chubby? Grandpa mustache?" Her hand gesture as she describes.

Her employee nods, confirming the physical description. Watson's disappointed posture slumping dramatically and she frowns.

"Jim!? But I liked Jim...!"

"Well, _Jim_ was a real trash-talker about us. Had said something like how 'all those corporate roaches will get what's coming to them' or something like that. Oh! And how he 'hopes they will burn down.'"

"I gave him and his wife anniversary presents..." The CEO continues to think, feeling more than a little betrayed by the old man she's made small talk with for years. She assumed he had been someone she could confide in. Then Michelle pauses, a thought forming. "I don't think he knows it's _this_ company. Or about me, I think."

"Well he probably doesn't know _you_, but he does know me...and he will learn later." The employee walks over to the wide floor-to-ceiling windows that overlook the city. The newspaper stand clerk, Jim, is down the sidewalk from the entrance of the company building, and the CEO would have to walk past the vendor in order to leave the block.

It's disappointing for Michelle because Jim is a good person-associate of hers. He's a nice man and always provided an interesting and closely personal view into the public eye that she lost years ago; Jim is climbing up in age, returned from out of retirement with his wife in need of a a busier schedule by working again. From her time spent talking with him, the CEO knows that Jim and his wife have been married for over thirty years, she has a vague recollection of their birth dates and anniversary and that they have two children and seven grandchildren in total; that Jim's favorite film is _The Godfather_ and his wife's is _You've Got Mail_.

The CEO sighs. This is yet another disappointment adding to her growing pile that doesn't seem to be stopping any time soon as the news continues to play.

The television's volume is turned up louder.

##  _Shared from an anonymous leak, the CEO’s previously inherited corporation has been taking money exchanges from six different places and to pay off several “shady” deals including forgery, personal bonuses and loitering, our sources says. For what exactly, we have yet to hear a comment from the head and CEO of Cedill, Michelle Watson._

The finger of Michelle's employee runs around the corner edges of a single paper on Michelle's wide desk; it's typed, single-spaced, like an obnoxiously long letter or list that he has to squint to read but it makes his head ache even more to look at.

"So that's why there's reporters from news stations downstairs wanting to have an appointment with you," he muses.

"You sound surprised about this," Michelle notes, suspecting he'd already known. The television is on mute now and the remote tosses between her slender hands.

The employee raises his hands in innocence.

He's one of those in charge from the building's marketing department. He's wearing a grey and black pinstripe suit with a dark blue bowtie—he's personally into fashion statements and takes pleasure in enforcing the company dress code.

"I'm finding this out at the same time as with you!"

Sighing, Michelle glances back at the television. The news reporter has changed to a pale skinned brunette recounting the scores to the sports games the nigh before.

"Would you want me to do anything for you, Ms. Watson?"

Michelle is hard-faced and tense as she thinks. The remote smacks in a rhythm into the palm of her hand. Her short nails click across the hard plastic as she thinks, swaying her hips. Finally, she answers: "Decline those reporters downstairs. Tell them 'no comment.' That's all. And now...I just need to set up some meetings and figure out where the hell this came from. Is—is it a rumor? Is it blackmail? Or is it a word..." She doesn't like to think of the possibilities but there are more questions than answers and finding out who it is is her high priority, no matter how impossible it feels with her position. She considers hiring a private detective.

Michelle takes a Skype call with several other corporate representatives in discussion of what has happened.

Word is already spreading. No one is pleased.

* * *

At 9 o'clock on a weekday morning, Peter Parker is scheduled to assist an interview of Cedill Enterprise's Vice President, COO, Jasmine Freeman. The interview is to be headed by star reporter Betty Brant, Parker being the photographer and tagging along to not be late.

But all of it, the entire interview, is bad timing: the initial interview was pre-scheduled three months ago to market the company's advances since the previous CEO's retirement, but since the recent news, another email was send and the subject has changed.

Since she's the Vice President, Jasmine is to be the spokesperson for the company...until the allegations hit the news and interviews were denied until today. Now, having got word from her boss that no questions are to be answered about the allegations, Jasmine sits poise in the armchair as Betty tries to keep the air casual and calm.

Adrenaline and pride pumping through her, Betty is the more eager to complete this interview, seeming willing to put up a fight for it back at the office. As Peter adjusts the settings on his camera, he can't blame her ambition, admires it at times, even—she's getting the first exclusive interview since the news leaks to the press.

"And with any luck, this could be as big as a scandal as the ones with Stark Industries or the effects of that leak by Roxxon," she'd spoken earlier during the drive here.

In the spare room cleared for this interview, Peter finishes setting up for the photos he wishes to take towards the end of the interview. He's also here as a secondary reporter but from the years of working with Betty, he knows that she wouldn't need the assistance.

And she _doesn't_; she's relentless with her questions and _successfully_ balances that line between being blatant and suggestive, of stating and inquiring. She mentions that the previous CEO has been suspected of having dicey relations. She notes how the current CEO hasn't been in office for a long in comparison, and assuming Watson has an affluent background, asks if there are any _schemes_ she's inherited from the former CEO.

Peter sits in the chair beside Betty as a kind of third wheel onlooker, the rapidly rising tension between both women making his ears ring and his eyebrows twitch. When Betty begins asking about the CEO—a hot current topic, understandably—Peter lowers his head, frowns, and scratches at the space between his eyebrows.

Jasmine shifts her weight; she becomes subtly defensive, her chin raising to meet Betty's arrogance.

There isn't a clock in the room; framed stock pictures hang on two opposite walls. The small table between them is bare save for a calendar covering its surface, a stapler, staple remover, and a barely empty pencil holder. The paper cups of lime-infused water Peter and Betty were offered early are creating heavy rings of condensation on the surface.

Jasmine laces her French-tip-painted fingers and widens her customer-service smile and answers that the CEO would prefer if no one speaks for her, answering questions, or things otherwise that she can do herself.

Betty asks if Jasmine thinks it would be possible to schedule an interview with the CEO in the future.

Jasmine's jaw tightens. "I will relay your question," she says through her painfully content smile. "But like I said, I cannot and I am not guaranteeing anything as I cannot speak for the CEO."

By the fourth question Betty asks about the michelle Watson, Jasmine wears a narrowed-eyed glare of high suspicion and an expression of annoyance. Once again reiterating that she isn't allowed to answer any similar questions, she reminds Betty: "But I'll be happy to continue this interview about our company...since that is _why_ it was conducted in the first place."

And Peter watches, for one of the few times ever, as Betty backs down and agrees, giving a nod and returning to the notes scribbled on the notepad in her lap.

A voice recorder sits silently on the small table between them.

Peter hesitates, adjusts the aperture of his camera's lens.

The mid-morning sunlight reflects off neighboring skyscraper windows, shines through the room's wide, uncovered windows and bounces of the coffee table's glass covering, reflects off of Betty's watch, blinds Peter's eyes.

He manages to snap a few photographs of the women before Jasmine calls him off.

The interview will take an hour and forty-six minutes in total. In the meantime, Peter breaks off to find a restroom and then a water fountain. And it's in between the two that he runs into the CEO at a vending machine—only that he doesn't _know_ it's the CEO. In their brief passing, he asks for directions to the nearest water fountain, makes a joke about the expansive building space but having to hunt for simple things. She chuckles, and Peter's asks, "Do you work on this floor?"

She wrestles to open a bag of Skinny Pop popcorn from the vending machine. "Yeah. For a couple years now." It's answered with a hint of smugness and knowing that Peter doesn't put a finger on for _why._ She eats three popcorn as he fumbles around an appropriate response—shrugging his shoulders, ultimately gives an "I dunno, just..." and shrugging again.

"Cool camera," she compliments as he's inching away, feeling the conversation fizzle out.

Peter doesn't reply because he knows that she's watching him leave; he wouldn't be surprised if she is _laughing_ about the poor conversation.

By the time he returns to the interview, Betty has scheduled a follow-up, taking the date of an event previously marked by an old secretary before their leave. Peter snaps a head shot of Jasmine for the article; it doesn't go unnoticed how the glass door that encloses several offices, including the room they exited, closes a lot heavier as they leave than when they entered.

* * *

**Email from bettebrantleeds:** _I feel like I should inform you that the nice woman we met at Cedill, The COO, has cancelled the follow-up interview. She sent me an email at three this morning though I wouldn't doubt it was sent by an underpaid intern. There were so many grammar mistakes._

_Your picture looked great by the way. Jameson and Robertson liked the way it looked in print -- but you know that already._

_By the way, Robertson wants you at the meeting this morning at 10. I hope you're already up. Your phone was called about three times._

* * *

**BREAKING:** _TENSIONS BETWEEN SPIDER-MAN AND HOBGOBLIN ESCALATES AS THEY FACE OFF IN MID-AIR BATTLE._

_It seems as if the Hobogoblin, formally known as Roderick Kingsley, has finally gotten his claws in Spider-Man, ending the two years vendetta. Spider-Man, who has taken up the vigilant name and now donnes a black suit..._

The misspelled villain name is probably a typo but to many readers it is an amusing one.

* * *

It’s uncommonly known and more so learned through the handful of articles published that Michelle Janae Watson is a part of the dime-sized percentage of those who were able to punch a hole of entry into the secluded corporate world and climb the latter to the top. Her success as becoming CEO, its headquarters stationed in the city, is nothing short of _luck_—per the opinion of a click-bait article writer but the thought already preexisting among her corporate peers. Some excuse her success originating from pity—for _diversity points_ and other performative choices. Others chalk her success as being from nepotism but that is quickly debunked—when it's explained that she won an internship a year after finishing high school, had continued working within the company, eventually befriended her bosses and then the CEO and skyrocketed through the ranks, it's then understood just exactly _how_.

Following, is the first and only time CEO Michelle Watson is put in front of a camera, and then this information is surely _known_.

As rumor around the workplace goes, Ms. Watson strikes the same fear belonging to the "mean parent" or "cruel professor" who you're afraid to be punished by. She's the last resort when facing a conflict and the last face you want to see or voice over the microphone. She’s the last person you come to when things fuck up to the highest, when someone is being dealt with the heaviest information. In short, you don't _ever_ want to be called up to Ms. Watson’s office if it wasn’t pre-scheduled business.

“I hear she eats animal hearts.”

“Someone told me that her mother was a welfare queen."

She holds the same stereotypical fear belonging to CEOs. She holds the same expected fear belonging to someone like her.

Michelle—no, _Ms. Watson_ dresses in sophisticated pinstripe skirts or urban versions of pantsuits and wears expensive, pure gold jewelry that cost more than your paycheck, but she still wears the brand of her mother’s hand-me-down lipstick. She tries to appear confident and luxe enough to keep her strong footing, because, for her, she believes if she doesn't _look_ the part, respect comes with difficulty.

But to do her best she doesn't want influences and thus actively works to keep her name and her face out of the press. Michelle has done a small number of interviews in the past: for tv spots, for a quote for a newspaper, all small in number enough to be counted on one hand. Her personal details aren't well-known to the public and her face isn’t recognized outside of work and for that, she’s grateful.

But when her long-time-ago assistant, a nice lady named Felicia Hardy informed Ms. Watson that there are rumors of forgery and possible money loitering happening behind her back and that a rival corporation will be hitting home much closer than she thinks, Ms. Watson feels like the steady boat of a company she's inherited isn't as durable as she'd been previously told. Felicia informs all this right before she announces that she’s quitting, and Michelle is _thrown_ by it all.

She’d begun having thoughts that Felicia didn’t particularly _like_ her because they’re merely years apart in age and in drastically different positions, Felicia only earning the assistant position because they had been friends...or Michelle _thought_ they were friends until Felicia declined, in attitude. But _this information ambush_ wasn’t any easier to handle.

And to make matters worse, Michelle's to answer a media questionnaire about this very topic in the next four days because word has already gotten out and she’s not quite ready for this. She’s upset and almost _angry_ about it—because she’s been able to keep this company churning and eliminated any possibility of dirty work before it arose and she's been able to keep out of the tabloids and she'd even kept Felicia's awful assistant abilities under wraps.

So, Michelle surely isn’t having _the best_ of luck anymore, she isn't having the best _month_, even, it seems.

She informs her marketing department and discusses possible ways to handle their reputation in light of the media trying to shine a light in their faces.

On day two, she vents to the journal kept in her bedside drawer and bottles of Carbonadi and Cognac. By day three, she strategizes with appropriate representatives on how to handle the negative situations and she learns what she can about these spreading stories around the growing crowds of newbie reporters entering her building's lobby; and she schedules more meetings and she doesn’t get to bed until 3 A.M. on the night before her interview. Michelle falls asleep with a cup of tea forgotten on her desk and her hair badly tied up in a silk scarf that will come loose in her sleep.

* * *

**To: bettybrantleeds**

**Reply Email from peterbparker:** _Those from Cedill Enterprise must have read the article because I got a random email. You're right about the grammar... I don't know what they think about it besides that they liked my portrait photo and now the CEO wants to see us. I guess you got that second interview. You're welcome. Oh, and they liked the nice sugar cookie portrayal you gave them._

* * *

**LOCAL WEEKLY:** _INFAMOUS THIEF BLACK CAT PUTS OUT AN ALL-CALL TO HUNT DOWN SPIDER-MAN._

When Peter gets a moment of privacy, he phones Miles Morales, is answered by voicemail, and leaves a very confused and energized questioning of “What the hell is going on?"

* * *

Betty doesn't get the chance to take the follow-up interview. In fact, Cedill's representative outright request a different reporter, one who isn't as steadfast or irritatingly persistent as the needle-like pestering she'd done. So, obviously, tough, sly, and sassy reporter Joy Mercado gets the assignment right before she's to go undercover for a different story.

They say that there wasn't bitterness about it but when Betty finds out her loss of the story, she reveals more with her eyes than her words, so the lie doesn't gain much believability.

The previous reporter isn't even mentioned when Joy Mercado and Peter Parker push through the front lobby, name tags and chunky equipment bag in hand and squeezing past the growing crowd of first-time and slightly seasoned reporters who still overpay on specialty sugary coffee drinks and one-time-worn relationships building t-shirts they're told are mandatory. The two from The Bugle are met with glares and complaints accusing unfairness as they're escorted by a uppity man in a one-button classic suit.

The meeting room for the interview is different than the last—it's larger, wider, they're told, and it's unexpectedly closed off, they find, by a heavy wooden door that clicks shut a little too loudly and Peter has to resist the urge to rub his ear in discomfort.

The pair is greeted by Jasmine Freeman who is noticeably calmer than before and she _smiles_, seeming genuinely, and answers Joy's question about their interviewee—Jasmine confirms that they will be meeting the CEO and will be in charge of one of her few public exposures. Before she leaves for a meeting with another company's sponsor, Jasmine wishes the duo “good luck," leaving them alone with the three waiting chairs in the hallway outside the CEO's room, and it is likely his own over-analyzing when Peter picks up an underlining tone to her "good luck."

After Jasmine's departure, Joy gives a very confident smirk. Peter rolls his eyes.

They're five minutes late.

Joy always, coincidentally, has the best of luck out of all The Bugle employees. And Peter, not so much.

Two men walk out when the office door finally opens. The CEO is a woman who whom they have only heard about and whom Joy puts on a persona for that's a little too enthusiastic, shaking her hand as if meeting a role model. Contrasting, the CEO gives a plain, tight-lipped smile in return—and Peter has the sudden stunning realization that she's the woman from the vending machine.

"Thanks for coming," she greets, holding the door for them to enter and motions to her desk past the oversized Chaise chairs set placed in the center of her expansive office.

Peter muses with the front of his hair, displacing it.

"We, The Bugle, are _extremely grateful_ for this opportunity of being chosen. We promise to set all the rumors straight for you, Ms. Watson."

The CEO responds with a professional yet unconvinced grin, shaking their hands as the duo sit across from her. "Yes. We'll see."

And then Joy is chatting away, buttering the woman up with compliments to coax her open for conversation. She tells that she's a fan of Ms. Watson's progress, that she bought stocks in the company only when hearing of the other's takeover. She sticks to the line of "Women have to stick together."

Peter resists the urge to roll his eyes, remembering, once, Joy's very clear and unprovoked commentary about a group of women exiting a club together, drunk off their feet and yelling for a taxi.

Michelle Watson leans back at her wide, expensive looking desk, crosses her knees, and leans with an elbow on her chair's armrest. It's impossible to tell if she's phased by Joy's praise. Yet, she doesn't interrupt Joy as she continues on her tangent.

Joy explains her familiarity about how Michelle Janae Watson was able to climb the latter to CEO of the local city’s company, and then about her having earned an internship only a year after high school graduation and had continued to work at Cedill; her eventually befriending all her bosses and then the former CEO, as it’s understood.

There are few credible sources for this information, she previously researched. Most others are the paparazzi who are always looking for their next paycheck by whatever gossip they can start. Because of this, Michelle Watson has kept out of the media, being in front of a camera only six times before.

After Joy finishes, eventually, the interview begins.

Michelle taps the pen in-hand over the desk's surface, over papers prepping answers to questions she expected to be asked. Her stare lingers on Joy, who does most of the talking, and every so often flickers to the man occasionally snaps pictures of them. He takes three before assuming Michelle's lingering stare is from irritation.

Minutes before their arrival, Michelle finished her coffee and croissant, the ring of condensation still beside her name plate—polished and very customized, it's observed, the gold plating made thick and prominent—and remnants of leftover crumbs linger near the edge where not all were brushed into a waste basket in her haste.

Peter's eyebrow raises, noting.

She's applied a new layer of lipstick, and slides her lips together as she thinks of how to formulate her words to answer Joy's next question. She straightens her clothes, runs manicured fingers through heat-straightened hair almost as if she's _nervous_, almost like she's _unsure_.

Peter's thumb runs around the camera's setting ring.

There's a small circular aluminum bin resting in front of her keyboard, almost out of view, the three mints she's taken from it still lingering in her breath.

The pictures on the side bookshelf making up her desk's background have only three personal pictures: familial, he assumes.

And Joy seems to have picked up on it too, directing her next question to the aforementioned photographs. They're of Michelle's parents, her grandparents healthy and together before her grandfather was hospitalized, and of her and the previous CEO. Michelle shares a sugarcoated story for the press about each photo.

Joy smiles all the way through but it's cold. Michelle's act is also a performance.

Everyone is wearing a mask.

A line Michelle very nearly shares is doing this very act of performing for face-value is a repetitive yet necessary part of her job, the act having been developed to where she can do it perfectly without difficulty. She vanishes the subject from her mind to focus on the task at hand.

Next, she apologizes and offers the two Bugle reporters mints from a circular aluminum tin near her wrist.

Joy exasperates that it is her favorite brand of mints and takes two. Peter accepts one without the ass-kissing and it takes him less than five minutes more to come to terms that his presence holds no importance and barely any attention at all.

He proceeds to leave the room to give the two privacy to finish the interview. Secretly, he's going around to scour the floor. Slinging the camera around an arm and tucking his clip-on press pass into his shirt, he waves to a passing employee, hoping he doesn't stand out too much.

He quickly finds the break room; outside, he bumps into a girl who couldn't be more than twenty-six—an intern, he assumes—and takes advantage by apologizing for his clumsiness and leeway into asking is she's new (she isn't, and has been an intern for two months) and if she's met the CEO of the company, feigning that he's only known of her presence through overhearing that she's performing an interview down the hall.

The girl shakes her head. No one's seen the CEO, she tells; very few who aren't department heads have met with her personally.

He asks her opinion about the CEO, especially given the scandal allegations leaked to the news stations.

At this, the girl's eyes widen—she hadn't known details about the allegation, and tells such.

Peter finds as he asks around more, it turns out that nearly no one has heard about it, it airing and discussed when everyone is deeply in work or because some televisions aren't turned to the news stations.

When he's caught snapping candid photos, he first lies that they're part of a personal hobby. When he's caught again, his Bugle pass falls out from his unbuttoned Polo shirt and he has to admit that he's photographing for his visit to the company headquarters. This time, he gets less information compared to those previously.

In the nick of time a text message from Joy gives him the excuse to end the high-tension questioning.

As Michelle continues gushing about her gratefulness to the previous CEO and what a great mentor she had been, almost immediately Peter realizes that this talk is a placeholder, something to eliminate silence until his return.

Giving Joy's wrist two taps and subtly signaling to his camera, the interview comes to an official end. She speaks to Ms. Watson an invitation for a "small, fun photo shoot for the cover" that sounds more like a question.

The woman blinks slowly—she's thinking, weighing her options, considering and deciding how much more generosity she should allow. Slowly, her gaze slides to the man with the hybrid DSLR cradled between his hands. "I guess that would be with you?" She nods to him.

Peter assures she's correct...and he isn't expecting how _tall_ she is when she stands—with her heels she nearly stands a head above both he and Joy.

The other reporter even takes a step back for a view.

Michelle—“Ms. Watson” is dressed in [a striped pantsuit with a wide neckline, diamond chandelier earrings, and _try me_ red lipstick and _I wish you would_ pumps.](https://66.media.tumblr.com/003c7e0f33905a7a8b6a4a1542d62e41/tumblr_p4epygOH7C1scypcro2_400.jpg)

Peter swallows before kindly—near timidly—orders the CEO to position in front of her expansive bookshelf. Joy silently watches the woman cross her knees and lean back in the chair, hands on either armrest, and staring directly into the camera. The reporter nearly comments that Ms. Watson must not be well-versed in taking professional photographs.

It’s lightly rumored around the office that Ms. Watson's eyeliner is sharp and has cut an employee. It’s a not-so-lie telltale that she’s never come to work with a strand of hair out of place; the laxest she's arrived to the office is with her fingernails not always painted.

Joy has to swallow her tongue when Peter orders her to push one of the single-seater couches they were sitting in to the corner of the wide windows lining the front wall of Ms. Watson's office—swallow her tongue because, even though Joy smiles with a carefully mastered bubbly personality and has become an expert ass-kisser to the point that it's exhausting with how much she's handed, Joy very much despises being ordered around, much less by a fellow employee, and especially from one she still remembers who hadn't been well-versed or on-time enough to be grouped together with.

Joy holds her tongue but still rolls her eyes and goes to push the couch across the floor. She positions the sheer curtains to become the background and steps out of the way for the photographer to take the CEO's portrait.

"Don't make me look fat," Michelle jokes.

"You look beautiful, Ms. Watson," he assures, holding the camera's viewfinder to his glasses.

Joy's cellphone vibrates and excuses herself out into the hallway. It's Joe Robertson, her overseer, calling in urgency because they're late. Joy spends the remainder of her time explaining why her interview took so long.

Back inside, Peter briefly excuses himself to find a piece of equipment left in the bag near the office door. When he returns, [Michelle is posing, a hand to her hip, one shoulder exposed and excusing that this is her best look.](https://66.media.tumblr.com/035818955742c0873d4ea1b45c2d3475/tumblr_p4epygOH7C1scypcro1_400.jpg)

Peter is stunned. ...And it takes him longer than it probably should to realize that she's judging her look in the small mirror hanging far behind him, on the wall to the left of the door. He nods and just silently snaps more photos, not wishing to stir any ill-feelings, he allowing her to turn and shift for the camera as she pleases.

The series of camera shutters is interrupted when Joy pokes her head back inside to ask how it is all going, her impatient undertone very clear. The reply received is equally matching her passive aggressiveness always shown.

Michelle relaxes in her chair, watching Peter play with his camera's settings.

"Do you like your job?"

His head snaps upward, unsuspecting the question. "Um, excuse me?"

"I said do you enjoy your job?" A manicured hand drums the end of the armrest once. "I don't mean to impose but you two make a _very interesting_ work duo."

Peter hums. Nods awkwardly. "Yeah; I like my job."

"But do you _enjoy_ it? The worst thing to see is someone working a job they find little joy in. And I...can feel you two's _dynamic_ from all the way over here." She smiles, politely.

One of the stories briefly shared for the press was how she helped find her parents jobs they found pleasure in; now they don't slave away to barely make rent. One of the points she seemed to want to bring the most attention to is her desire to help others as much as she can, giving handouts and donations as much as possible—but of the exact finances of doing so, she refused to give out. Determining what perspective that is viewed from, it can be seen as suspicious false-hearted behavior.

(In truth, Michelle wished to not share because of the company's currently falling finances and she has to remain strong.)

"I'm well, Ms. Watson. But what you did for your parents was very generous and amazing."

She doesn't believe him.

"Of course." Her eyes stay on him as he squats for a different angle. "It is my job."

Five more rapid shutters later, Peter begins wrapping up and gathering his belongings. "Even if I said I wanted to leave, I couldn't," is mumbled in a sigh.

And Michelle straightens her posture, squares her shoulders, and continues her professional demeanor and acts as if she hadn't heard.

Exiting the office and walking towards the elevator, Joy speaks for the both of them and thanks the CEO again for the opportunity for the interview. She also informs that Ms. Watson can expect to hear back from The Bugle about the progression by the end of this week.

"Progression?"

"Yes, from my editor. And it'll likely be about the investigation."

Michelle nods. "I suppose you _could_ say it's an investigation by now, unfortunately...since its hit the public." Her smiling is now incredibly strained.

As they walk, Michelle tells that she’s already gotten others to begin looking into it, she's hiring to have eyes tracing to where the starting point began from, and she’s waiting to hear back from a news station. In truth, it's all lies to continue making everything appear more put-together than it really is.

Joy tries to convince Ms. Watson to include The Bugle's investigators, noting those who have cracked big cases. The two ignore passing employees and Peter at their side, the attention tunneled to each other, both intended on trying to convince the other.

Her fake smile stays strong. “With all due respect, Ms. Mercado, there are already enough people working on this case and I don't think they would need any more. There’s nothing to see.” She'd be damned if she accepts handouts to fix _her_ company.

But Joy is also an expert at faking it and can see through it, so she forces one right back. “Please, Ms. Watson—”

Michelle presses the elevator button for them.

“Well... My editor and I will be in touch. This was a _wonderful_ opportunity. Thank you, Ms. Watson.”

Michelle hopes to hear a decline or back off from the editor, but instead, most of her leads for her investigation drop.

Likewise, Joy isn’t expecting to hear, later, that one of the journalists will be sent in to work undercover at Michelle's company headquarters. She's much less expecting for the assignment to _not_ go to her—Joe Robertson, her boss, sharing the decision made that Joy had made herself too prominent to go in undetected or be forgotten, and it should instead go to someone else who's already scoured the building and the CEO herself... When Joy is told this, she is _livid_.

And because she's too busy to care and has seen more journalists in a short amount of time to properly remember faces, Michelle doesn't realize she sees the same photographer/reporter from before.

* * *

**INTERVIEW EXCLUSIVE**: NOTORIOUS THIEF, BLACK CAT, GIVES A LOOK INTO THE LIFE OF A VILLAIN AND INSIGHT ABOUT THE STOCK MARKETS!

The interview is very short, in the 200-word count, and was conducted in a coincidental run-in with the aforementioned burglar. The headline also completely ignores Black Cat's denial that she's a villain.

* * *

Michelle walks into her office with a caffeinated tea in one hand ordered from the small over-priced coffee store a block away, a hair pulled back in a straightened ponytail, and wearing tinted sunglasses to hide that she hadn’t finished her makeup that morning. She greets her employees in passing and nods politely as she makes her way to the elevator and rides it up to her office where she locks the door, deposits her cup at her desk, and uses the hanging mirror besides her door to finish her makeup. She'd overslept that morning; she assures herself aloud it was okay as she puts on bright red lipstick, adjusts her collar, and checks out her reflection.

On the cusp of two months later, Peter finds himself back at Cedill Enterprise in the form of a job interview.

An hour after her arrival, a woman from the floor's desk informs that her appointment has arrived. The announcement arises something within her that she can't quite put a name to—nervousness; familiarity and negativity associated with it; anxiety.

She preps herself under breath as she clears off her desk—by stuffing everything the _In_ and _Out_ sorting baskets—straightens her posture, smooths her hair, steels her shoulders, and raises a confident chin. At the last minute she pops into her mouth three leaf-shaped mints from the small circular tin near her keyboard. Her interviewee walks in and she hurriedly chews the mints and swallows. She's ready, professional, hardens her expression—

It falters when he enters. Well, her _eyes_ do, her hardened gaze earning a fracture crack, but still she falters—not because of his height, and not because his wide, unassuming eyes scan the room until falling upon her, and he hesitates. Michelle's gaze falters because for a corporate office job interview, he's arrived in a plain button-down, a suit jacket, and fucking Levi jeans, his hair terribly fixed and windblown because, she assumes, he's used too much gel and she wrinkles her nose at this. At him. At his _jeans, _especially.

The interviewee meets her at her desk and awkwardly juts out his hand in introduction. His words come out a little bit winded; Michelle takes his hand, gauging his personality by the force of his handshake, and when he doesn't squeeze the life out of hers, she allows herself to relax a bit. When she notices he's staring, she allows a small smile to slip out.

He looks like he swallows his tongue. And he’d be lying if he said that he wasn’t _the least_ bit nervous but simultaneously infatuated as the interview takes off, because she’s clearly very smart, obviously so very confident, and she’s stunning. Beautiful, he'd dare say, and he has to pull at his collar once, twice, has to clear his throat in-between questions, and he feels like she’s looking straight _through_ him, looking inside him and at his secrets as she looks him up and down.

This man, her interviewee, speaks with stumbling confidence and an intense eye contact that makes her double-check and avert her gaze when she starts feeling a little _too_ exposed and pinpointed. She listens to him tell about his sporadic work history until landing a job at a newspaper company during and after college, how he lost his inspiration, briefly working at Stark Enterprises until rediscovering his love of photography. He purposely leaves out The Bugle's name and any clues that might lead to her connecting the dots. Even on his resume, and upon the orders of his bosses, he's changed The Bugle's name to one of their partner's titles.

She glances at him as she asks questions in between scanning his resume and tries to think about why he feels so _familiar_. She's sure she's never seen him before but pushes it aside and offers to order something to drink. He settles on water. It's ordered by one of the women from the floor's front desk.

As they wait, his fingers fidget absentmindedly over his thighs—and Michelle pushes aside that feeling that she's seen him before, questioning why he wants to work for her company.

The answer he gives is well rehearsed and just what she wants to hear.

Michelle briefly converses with the secretary when she returns. In the meantime, Peter studies the framed works hanging—two college degrees, a headline clipping of her inheriting the company, adding to the series of other accomplishments from the one before—of the wall of books and the personal photographs on the bookshelves, and the expensive furniture leftover by her predecessor.

Michelle ends her quick talk with by thanking the secretary for the water. Peter has already emptied half of his paper cup. She notices this; hasn't even touched hers, her pink nude-painted nails tapping around the height of her paper cup.

He looks less awkward than he feels, him knowing he's under-qualified for this workplace. He thinks back to Joy Mercado describing the CEO akin to Miranda Priestly from _The Devil Wears Prada_—although Peter had little understanding who that was.

Finally, bluntly, Michelle makes a comment: “You okay there, Mr. Parker? You’re a little…”

"Great! I'm great, just...dehydrated. It's the heat. Summer, you know." He overestimates how much water he has left when lifting the cup.

She taps his papers over her desk. "Well, I can say that this interview is over..." She's fallen back into her guarded, stone-faced, public persona. "There's just one last question."

She shifts her posture; crosses her legs. She’s scrutinizing him, he knows, as he's asks for his opinion involving rumors and speculations heard throughout the grapevines or media.

He has.

She explains that with accepting this job comes a promise that he's sworn to secrecy with anything and everything he finds out, and all information to be reported back to her immediately. But if he doesn't agree with any of the requirements, including those on the job description, he's free to decline the job.

"Is any of this going to be a problem, Mr. Parker?"

"No, Ms. Watson."

He fidgets with his button cuffs. His assignment by The Bugle is that he's to work under the CEO of Cedill Enterprise as an undercover investigative journalist. For his luck, his name was never disclosed when he came with either Betty Brant's or Joy Mercado's interviews.

Likewise, she's looking for a new assistant to help her juggle her responsibilities as she tries to sort this company's situation out, as she tries to search for quality investigators and get to the source of both who the culprits are and who leaked it all to the press instead of to her.

With the interview over but not truly, knowing there is the social section of the interview process, Peter allows himself to relax—apparently it was enough that it was taken notice. Michelle uses it as an invite to voice the question that hasn't left her mind.

Tucking her arms under her chest, she asks, "Have we ever, I don't know, in the past, spoken before?"

His anxiety flares back up. "No... I guess I just have _that type_ of face," Peter chuckles, lying. "...I've been told that before, actually."

"Oh." She keeps her elbows on her desk. "I just couldn't put a finger on it... And I couldn't help but think—when you said you went to Midtown High in New York—I had gone there too."

His anxiety is extinguished again, a small grin of relief breaking across his face. "What year did you graduate?"

As it turns out, they attended throughout the same years.

Michelle begins reads his name on his resume again, thinking out loud.

"Parker. P-Peter Parker, ma'am," he interrupts, eager to keep her attention to this and not let it wander to any of his visits under The Bugle's interviews. "I think we might have had—"

"History class together. Did you have Mr. Andrews?"

He had taken the class, shocked that Michelle remembers. "Did you have Ms. Mahoney? In eleventh grade?"

"I think I did!"

As it turns out, they shared at least one class together in each high school year.

Michelle concludes that this is how she knew his face but not his name. Privately, she in fact doesn't remember many from high school because she worked on not holding on to them and worked to put it all behind her except for the few friends she managed to hold on to for a few years.

And since the tension is mostly gone between them now, Peter’s stuttering has diminished. But when she stands to call out the door for a refill and returns, leaning against the desk's edge beside him, she catches him wetting his lips nervously with the similar gander of his younger self and sees that he’s quietly blushing by the ears. She chuckles to herself about this. It's a pleasing look on him, she thinks.

Michelle clears her throat, changing the track of her thoughts.

Also, because some of the tension has lifted, Michelle reveals that she's feeling rather good about his application and she more thoroughly shares all the information that she can about the company's current struggle. Later, she will share the ominous threat from another corporation that her previous ex-assistant left. But for now, she has to get through the remaining three interviewees waiting outside her office.

Announcing the time, it's used as a full close for Peter's interview. Walking to the door, her fingers touch his shoulder and she _swears _a chill runs down his back, and Michelle takes in his blushing ears and remembers his intriguing resume and how he's pulling at his collar and she's _tempted_, she's very tempted to bring play into her work—and considers both possibilities of it being just for the eyes or light teasing—but banishes the idea as she opens the door for him to leave and for her next interviewee to enter.

* * *

A week later, Peter Parker begins his undercover job as the assistant to CEO Michelle Watson.


	2. The one where Peter learns MJ hates her birthday (Friday the 13th)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Chapter Prompt: it’s michelle’s birthday but she hasn’t celebrated it with anyone for reasons unknown. she forbids anyone from her company to give her gifts or even swing a happy birthday in her direction. well, peter didn’t exactly get the memo. how she reacts is up to you.**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Chapters and story are driven by prompts sent to my Tumblr writing blog. Those prompts are rearranged to be in timeline order._

To be very, vitally honest, Peter hadn’t known. It wasn’t his fault; this wasn’t on the job entry form, wasn’t on any of the neatly written, overbearingly and meticulously organized pamphlet that greeted him on his first day, filled with all the office in’s and out’s, of what he _shouldn’t do_ and what he _should do_ for the job, and it didn’t come up in small talk with other employees around the office. This wasn't even a part of any of his _plans_, but in the first few week of his new job as the CEO's personal assistant, when he sees an event left unmarked on the calendar spanning his desk's surface—it likely left over by whomever the previous assistant had been, he concludes—and with this new information, he’d done what any sensible person would have done. And he thinks it would help make him appear _grateful_ for earning the job.

Months later on the marked-off date of that calendar, Peter meets his boss in the early morning and greets with her usual order of chai tea at 8:43, the tea now lukewarm from his journey to the small restaurant a block away. The pained expressions received from passing employees when he mentioned this is still bright and clear in his mind, and he's grown slightly nervous.

He gives a curt, polite nod and opens with, “’Morning, Ms. Watson. Happy birthday,” and begins reading off an emailed list she gave him earlier that week when he trails to a stop because she’s staring at him like he’s just said something _detrimentally offensive_.

“Um, Ms. Watson...?”

“Excuse me—_what?_”

“What? What’s—is there something—”

“What day is it?”

“Um...Thursday. The 13th, I think.” (It's actually Friday but doesn't want to be in the line of fire if she's already this unsettled.) He squints. “Why?”

She holds his stare for a moment longer before turning away. She'd been gathering something from inside her handbag, it sitting atop her desk as she pulls out a compact mirror, a notepad, two pens, a container of mints, a bag of M&Ms, a set of keys. The clock now reads that it's almost nine in the morning.

She’s turned back to her purse. “What were you saying for the day?” She's turned back to her purse; she's wearing her favorite pair of sunglasses, still, indoors.

Slightly confused but unwilling to press on it this morning, he continues with his recap: “There's a conference call scheduled for ten o'clock,” he reminds as she slowly takes a seat in her desk chair. “And then you have a meeting for four. In the meantime, there are a few papers that need your signature and several emails came in that you should probably look at, and someone from another branch asked about you after you left the other day so I scheduled a face-call because he said it was for contract, and there’s the machine in the break room—”

Michelle groans, then waves her hand with the excuse that she’ll just teach him how to forge her signature later and instructs him to write the emails for her. She’s sitting with both hands on the cup of chai, very slowly drinking it through the straw, nursing it like if she drank it too fast, something harmful might happen.

“I can’t do that,” Peter goes and Michelle rolls her eyes.

She pauses, staring at him again in that deprecating way. “Then why did you want this job?”

He gives a noise of confusion so she clarifies.

“Didn't you say in your interview not that long ago that you're not only overly qualified for this job but that you'll also show it in your work?”

“Yes ma'am, but I...”

A brow raises, challenging him.

Peter sighs. “I can't do your work _for_ you, I mean.”

In response, she gives him a questionable look, so he continues: “It’s against the law, for one, forging signatures. And two: I’ve ordered the big things so that they can all be done in time and all you have to do is sign.”

Michelle takes a drink from the lidded paper cup. “What time did you get here?” Her nose wrinkles without underlining meaning.

“8:30. That’s the time I’m supposed to…”

“Get me a drink, will you?”

He glances at the cup already in her hands; Michelle snaps her fingers and clarifies that she means something _alcoholic_.

“It’s still the early morning, ma'am.”

“Don’t call me _ma'am_. I thought that was already clarified.”

“Right,” he corrects. “It isn't even close to _noon_ yet,” he rewords his sentence.

“I know. There’s a small fridge around the corner there,” she points to a far corner in her office that leads to a mini kitchen facing the wide windows. “Something should be in there.”

“Ms. Watson—”

She sighs loudly, growing irritable, rubs her eyes from underneath her sunglasses. And Peter then notices one earring is falling out her ear and she holds a faint whiff of something _bitter_.

“Ms. Watson…. Were you _drinking?_” He almost doesn’t want to ask, not wanting to get her nerves going any more.

“_Pfft_. No. It’s early in the morning, Parker. Who do you think I am?” She takes a long drink from her chai. In reality, she’s currently experiencing a minor hangover. “Do you know how to make a cocktail?”

He doesn’t know how.

“Never mind. The drink’s fine enough on it's own.” It’s a hinted order for him to still bring back whatever alcohol is stored in the mini-fridge far back, behind the bottles of water and cold canned juice. “And can you close the blinds on your way over there? And bring a bottle of Advil? they're in one of the cabinets. Thanks.”

* * *

Peter doesn’t touch on either subject of her work or her drinking until later that afternoon when he’s following her down the busy city streets to whatever place she she goes during lunch break. He expects it to be some high-end restaurant like in the movies or the socially popular concept. Instead, it's a gathering of food trucks in a square lot behind several large buildings.

He stands at her side, feeling as out-of-place as he could possibly appear while in business attire surrounded by crowds of people dressed in casual wear, crop tops, and jeans.

Michelle orders fried calamari from a seafood truck. Peter fidgets with the edges of the notepad in his back pocket, desperately trying to remember why he thought it was fitting to bring it along. Once finished, Michelle tries to be a good hostess and asks Peter what he’s wanting to eat, but he declines. She orders him fried cod fish and french fries anyway.

They take a spot at a picnic bench once receiving their orders. Peter tries not to make direct eye contact with those he can tell are looking at them seconds _too_ long.

Michelle doesn't waste time in asking about his personal “side job” at the company.

First, it must be noted that Peter Benjamin Parker is dubbed a permanent member of the “loose lips” clubs. The creator of the club, an old friend from high school, once said that his horrible inability to keep anything a secret that raises his heart rate—which, it turns out, included his superhero identity, accidentally spilling it only six months after developing the superhuman abilities. What wasn't known—what was guessed but only in a joking manner—is that the “loose lips club” was a foreshadowing to Peter's later years...such as this.

It’s months after becoming the personal assistant to the CEO of Cedill when Peter accidentally, _completely unwittingly _let’s it slip that he's on a mission to uncover whoever is the snake in the company, and who leaked the information. Michelle, the CEO, takes the offer graciously but with suspicion, remembering that he recently quit his career with The Bugle—or, that's what he _told her_.

In actuality, Peter is undercover but has already begun digging himself such a deep grave that he isn’t yet sure if his shovel is strong enough to dig himself out.

“So... Have you found anything yet? And details, leads; any clues to who could have done something?” She means about who was the weasel in the company that began loitering money behind her back, giving away secret information, and leaking personal information of employees. It had to be someone apart of books and finances, she points aloud, and advises that department as his next target of inquiry.

Peter denies that he’s found anything specific as of now. Then, a thought comes to mind: “Your last assistant. Who were they?” Then he bites off half of a french fry.

There’s an extra beat taking her longer to answer, taken after her fork stabs into her food. “They were…someone who came in at the same time as me. I used to know her and we went through the internship together, so I thought to hired her… Relations, you know.”

“So it didn’t work out?” he asks before taking another bite, noting Michelle’s gradual silence.

“No, it didn’t...unfortunately.”

A pause is shared.

And it passes, prolonged.

“Is that why you don’t like birthdays?”

Peter isn’t subtle. At all.

And Michelle says as so.

He’s a lot of things, she’s learned during their time together so far—Mr. Parker is bashful, easy to blush, and he’s antsy at times; he’s steadfast, even headstrong, and punctilious. He’s both sides of the spectrum; he’s sporadic and mellow.

He’s currently trying a packet of fish sauce over his food and Michelle is mirroring the offensive look she wore that very morning.

“Stop it,” she hisses, commanding. The picnic bench is suddenly uncomfortably hard and this area too open and her jaw muscles clenches once as her gaze _hardens_.

Peter’s confused.

“Don’t get ideas. Don’t make assumptions.”

“Then…_do_ you like birthdays? Because you keep giving me this angry-murder look—”

“I know what you’re doing and it isn’t going to work. You aren’t going to find out anything.”

A dark, unsmoothened brow of his raises. His posture remains aggravatingly lax. He chews. Swallows. Chooses about his next words carefully. “Taken from the calendar back in the office, your old assistant—I guess it was your old assistant—marked the date and it had a picture of a _present_ on it. And taking your reactions whenever it’s mentioned… It just makes you think…”

Michelle is leaning aggressively forward and straight-backed. “Think what?”

Not wanting to test how badly saying _‘you’re hiding something’_ makes the situation worst, he chooses instead to finish: “_Something_ happened.”

“Oh, yeah? What’s that?”

“Something…private.”

“So now I’m a _suspicious _suspect?” She’s shielding her feeling of offense behind a calm tone.

She’s growing upset and feels betrayed by his suspicions, Peter notes. In reply, he doesn’t say anything further just continues reading at her, watching her breathing increase and her eyes flicker red emotion to his direction, and he eats more.

“Watch yourself, Parker. I’m on your side, remember?” It’s less of a question.

He silently watches her. He doesn’t reply further.

* * *

It’s three days later and Peter’s dragged along to a meeting with several other corporate heads because, Michelle insists, for Peter to grow familiar with others in her corporate business world. It's also a generous offer—and she speaks this—to lend him a firsthand meeting of potential others who could serve as a clue.

He thinks she watches too many investigative shows, but he attends without much comment.

After the meeting and when they’re on the ride back home does Peter pull out a small gift bag he had the driver hide. And Michelle’s wide-eyed look of curiosity flickers, fades, flames into anger when he tells with a small smile, “I got you something...even though I’m not sure if that’s even _allowed_—”

“It’s not.” The statement cuts him.

And he pauses. A “_why_” slips out before he knows.

“It’s just _not_.”

“_Why?”_

“You’re asking too many questions.”

“But who doesn’t like _birthdays_?”

Instead of giving a truthful answer, Michelle turns to the car's window. City lights pass by, streaking across the interior of the car, occasionally illuminating her scowl.

Admittedly, Peter’s curious about what happened but he isn’t going to pry. He’s too tired tonight. But, he insists her to take the gift bag anyway. “You don’t have to like birthdays...but can you at least like this?” He speaks up before she can object and goes, “No take backs. I took the tag off too, to make sure.”

Like a child, Michelle juts out her bottom lip.

When Michelle gets home later, she’ll see that the gift was a nicely embroiled silk scarf she doesn’t even remember admiring in a shop one day in passing (but Peter had). The wash-tag on it has the manufacturer’s logo. Around the glittery green tissue paper is a card—store-bought and personally signed—with the word ‘Birthday’ scratched out so it reads ‘Happy Cake Day’ instead. At the bottom is scribbled, _‘Most people would take the day off you know.’_

* * *

When Michelle comes in to work the next day, her new accessory is carefully snug around her neck and shoulders. She walks past Peter at his desk. He greets her before he looks up, catching her before she exited into her office. The smile he wears comes automatically and broad.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Leave a comment on ao3 if you like this! Reblog on Tumblr to spread the word and love!
> 
> Send a prompt to my Tumblr if you want to see more chapters (leaving comments is also motivation that will help get more chapters out)


	3. The one where there's an office party

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Chapter prompt: Company party!! It’s the holidays and Peter somehow gets invited for the company party (boosts morale, praise your employees, and give aways-stuff we have at my work) MJ ends up drinking too much and actually karaokes with everyone. She’s amazing and Peter can’t stop staring**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Chapters and story are driven by prompts sent to my Tumblr writing blog. Those prompts are rearranged to be in timeline order._

Long-suffering and obnoxiously enthusiastic personal assistant to the company CEO, Peter Parker is under-slept, under-appreciated, and his apartment is roughly the size of a small run-down roadside gas station's convenient store, but he’s worked _hard_ to get where he is and he’s going places. Will be getting places. Eventually. Probably. Any day now.

Or, at least, he _thinks_ he is.

And at least he isn’t as _underpaid_ anymore.

According to the payroll and gathered information from LinkedIn profiles belonging to three floors of employees here, every person is either an alumni from some prestigious university and graduated with marks, or received their position through strings pulled and names known. Only Peter and a handful of others, it seems during his searches, aren’t trust-fund babies or from upper class families.

At his desk, Peter’s currently lazily scrolling down list upon list of the employees here, skimming their their headshots and general profiles; the list he's constructed can be organized by last name and department floor. Near the top of his computer screen, he sees three men who gave him a “warm” frat-boy-esque welcome his first week on the job; below them are two others who nearly peer pressured him into attending an after-work get-together at a bar.

His boss, Ms. Watson, who has the highest position in this building, has been away for two weeks. There’s misshapen loose-leaf papers he's organized in half-assed stacks and Post-Its lining his computer’s screen detailing assignments Ms. Watson had assigned. Accidentally left over the weekend is a half-empty tumbler of cheap java coffee that sits at the far corner of his desk; he’d been wondering where he'd left that tumbler over the weekend...

Peter's so deep in thought he doesn’t notice his manager approaching, and jumps to attention when an over-stuffed folder is dropped near his keyboard accompanied with a casual “Hi.”

Peter blinks rapidly. Sits up, tries and fails at organizing his work area as the woman reads his desk’s name tag. Peter remembers from a brief meeting her as Jasmine Freeman, and he remembers from overhearing that she’s second in command under Ms. Watson, different in nearly every way to the CEO but just as hardworking.

“Patterson, is it,” she starts, taking in his desk’s mess of scattered cards and cruddy scribbled notes on torn pieces of paper taped to the surface; the wastebasket filled to the brim, and Jasmine's gaze settles on a small accumulation of crumpled notes.

“Parker, ma'am—actually.”

“Right. This,” and she directs to the folder bulging with papers that sits on the Nutrigrain wrapper he conveniently just finished, “is from half of all the heads from all the departments. You need to go through it and copy the information into a document before it goes to the boss. There should already be one left over from the last assistant that you could edit and begin with. Those old ones were....they weren’t really good. Hopefully,” she doesn’t hide her judgement about his clutter, “I _hope_ you’re much more efficient then they were.”

Peter nods, ensures that he will meet her expectations while he's brushing off energy bar wrappers and scratch paper into the waste basket.

“Good. We have to start going green, but after the power outage three months ago, the boss is trying to find a new alternatives as a back up plan. So when you’re done with that, let me know, okay?”

Again, Peter assures her commands. Then he pauses, pushes himself to ask before she turns away to leave: “Hey—out of curiosity—what happened to the _last_ assistant?”

The hesitance and flicker of emotion in her eyes isn’t missed, but it’s marveled at how greatly concealed it was. Peter catching her reaction only because of the high attention he’s paying.

“You don’t want to know,” is Jasmine’s answer.

“Oh. The typical _had to be let go_ because of school or bad typing skills?” His accompanied chuckle is nervous, fickle. It dies without amusement.

Jasmine thinks over her words carefully; shuffles the collection of binders she holds on her waist. “The immediate one right before you…was unfortunately cut down in the bloom of life a year ago.”

Not expect that answer, Peter doesn’t know how to respond.

Jasmine uses his reaction to mess with him and tries to make light of the subject. “But as long as you don’t stay out too late and alone, you’ll be fine. Oh, and don’t interact with the janitor who eats kumquats alone at the end of the hallway.” He asks why; before leaving, Jasmine answers, shrugging and smirking: “Everyone has their urban legends.”

(It’s a lie, he figures, but jump three weeks in the future when he’s leaving the office at 4 AM because he ran out to perform hero duties and has to stay overtime, Peter passes by a dead end hallway, sees an old janitor he hadn’t seen before sitting in a metal fold-out chair and peeling kumquats in his lap, Peter awkwardly waves, retracts his steps and takes the elevator down to the lobby, _praying_ that it wouldn’t stop working while he’s inside.)

* * *

Peter finishes Jasmine's assignment four hours and thirty Word pages later, sends it as an attachment with an email to Jasmine Freeman, and then encounters her immediately after, during his break hours and just after stuffing half of a pizza crust in his mouth.

“You’re from New York,” she opens, ignoring the man who approaches the coffee pot after her as he peers down at the small swallow she left behind.

Peter struggles to do his best at quickly swallowing down his food. “Yeah.”

“So are you a Jets fan? Harvey from your same floor is a _big_ fan.”

“Actually, I’m more into baseball.” He watches her pull creamer from the break room fridge and add it inside her mug—the calligraphy reads _I am a ray of fucking sunshine_. “I didn’t know Harvey was from New York.”

“Oh, yeah.” She's slowly approaching his table now and he composes himself. “Wouldn’t stop talking about it when he first came here.” She stops at the chair positioned across his table; she doesn't sit. “How long have you been here for? A month?”

“Five months.”

She’s shocked. “And the boss has you working day in and out, doesn’t she? ...Have you joining everyone at Scene65 on the Fridays before payday?” Jasmine thinks aloud. “I don’t remember hearing or seeing you there. It’s like tradition around here.

Peter explains that, on top of work, he’s usually kept too busy by personal matters to join at the bar…if he was ever invited.

“Really? I just assumed… Well, consider yourself invited now, Potter.”

“Thanks. …And it’s Parker—”

“Parker! Parker. Of course it is! Sorry. See you Friday?”

“Yeah...Sure.” He waves, feeling slightly awkward.

* * *

Peter doesn’t show up to the bar on that second Friday, prepared with some flippant excuse about needing to leave to get a head-start home because of a traffic pileup en route to his home.

He shows up to work on Sunday with a bruise brow and a prepared lie about “muggers.” He also finds out that avoiding the get-together that Friday had been a wise choice, as Harvey tried making fun of Peter, but due to the lacking knowledge of Peter’s presence and personal information—which can be a good thing as well as a sad note, depending on how it’s look at it—Harvey could only shit-talk about Peter liking baseball over football.

* * *

Ms. Watson returns from her two week trip also that Sunday, and all day she remains in her office. Peter doesn’t see her expect when she comes out for restroom breaks. He catches bits and pieces of phone call conversations and group conferences and he concludes that many of those she works with aren’t very nice or lenient about _change._

* * *

In the third week of Ms. Watson’s return, there’s an announcement sent via mass email about a company party. There aren’t e-cards or invitations given out but a location is—the company's building—and caterers will be providing foods like small sandwiches, cut fruit, shrimp and sauce, and cupcakes. Over email, Ms. Watson types that the party is to boosts morale and show appreciation to employees. Jasmine jokes that a great appreciation gift would be more days off. Also in the emails it states that everyone is given the opportunity to participate in a Secret Santa giveaway. Peter is tasked with sending out the email itself and the preparations.

The announcement and plans go smoothly until the early afternoon at precisely 2:15, and everyone in Peter’s department is to report to one of this floor’s three break rooms that is now beyond over-capacitated, some choosing to watch from their desks instead.

Until the party begins and Harvey, one of the borderline career socialite co-designer of the marketing department gets visibly _pissed_ when Peter’s ice breaker is “…So you’re in charge of the boxes and shipping?”

Following, Peter unintentionally embarrasses Joane, a fellow co-worker, with one too many nervous quips and offering her cheese after she complains of hunger only to be scolded that “_Cheese isn’t vegan! Are you _trying_ to kill me?!”_ And the mediocre Pandora music selection plays what sounds like upbeat elevator music on a loop; and it’s overheard that Denise and Andrew aren’t _even_ married,_ yet_ they’ve already moved in together for over six years and she’s sporting a vending machine ring with cheeky grins because “_At least her relationships can stay together, Gwyneth, so stop hating_.” And there are cheap decorations that appear fit more for a child’s birthday fashioned from Party City than for grown and middle aged adults in an office.

The party goes well until Peter’s leaning against a wall off to the side; it’s two hours into the party and he’s still working on his second cup of overly sweet punch that he’s _greatly certain_ has been spiked when he turned away; and he’s overhearing exchanges and explanations and complaining—he literally can’t tell which from who and he literally doesn’t _care_ to know—and he’s thinking back to the chain of events about how in the hell did he get into this—

And he can’t tell if it all is incredibly stupid or incredibly obvious what his decision is when Ms. Watson orders him to come aside so she can order him to fetch her a drink from inside her office, which Peter refuses to because “alcohol isn’t prohibited in the office.”

There’s a responding reprehensive _click_ to her facial features, in the tone of her gaze also. “Oh, someone’s read the handbook,” he swears she _mocks_ him, and she’s then dismissive. Her eyes go from a crinkle with a smile to a strain behind a daring glare and she’s practically towering over him in her high heels as she repeats: “I’d like a _drink_ from my office, Mr. Parker. _Immediately_, if you don’t mind.”

For him to oppose would be incredibly stupid, he finalizes, because there’s already the smallest audience of anticipating onlookers awaiting his response to the CEO. But he’s tired and frustrated enough after these few months of little to no leads in this undercover investigation, and he's falling behind on rent because most of his money earned goes straight to The Bugle, and he cannot go two weeks without hearing a death threat from from some criminal on midnight local news, and he’s _pretty sure_ that the CEO feels the same way, to an extent—from what he’s read about her prior, from what he knows about her _now_ and eavesdropping conversations. With this all on his mind, Peter concludes that a little drink _doesn’t quite matter_ in the grand scheme of things, remembering those exact words overheard from the booming voice of a man in one of Ms. Watson’s conference calls.

Following her directions, Peter finds the collection of small bottles of alcohol kept in the mini fridge—he’s surprised at _how much_ there is inside and their variety.

He returns with a red Solo cup filled with Coca-Cola mixed with nearly an entire quarter pint of vodka. Ms. Watson takes it wordlessly while she’s still talking, catching up with the marriage of one department head and an employee who recently had his sister and her kids move in with him.

In the meantime, Peter plays boring drinking games of Connect Four. By his fourth game, he’s instructed—_as her assistant,_ she makes sure to voice, clearly, this time—to go fix another drink for Michelle. He fetches her drinks two more times before deciding to slow and snoop.

In her office, he cracks open another can of Coca-Cola and pours an entire quarter pint of vodka in her tall cup; takes a glance toward her desk—at the opened notebook beside her keyboard, the overflowing _OUT_ tray and nearly empty _IN_ tray, a cold abandoned cup of tea, a crystal paperweight collecting dust in one corner, her cellphone beside a pen that begins to vibrate and is buzzing, buzzing, buzzing, _buzzing_…

Peter gets to know a woman named Catherine Wells, two men who graduated from a university in Michigan, and an older woman named Elsa Rosenbaum who reminds him of his Aunt May. With them, Peter plays would-you-rather and Uno. Distancing from the party chatter that has begun being overbearingly loud, the five of them pull up chairs around Elsa’s desk and continue their games of Uno while sharing embarrassing stories. Their fun is cut short when a coworker is calling from the doorway leading to the break room, announcing that Ms. Watson needs her assistant right away. As Peter leaves, he hears Catherine mutter in surprise that she hadn’t known _he_ was the CEO’s new assistant.

For the fifth time Peter enters the CEO’s office, shutting the heavy door behind himself, the noises of the party cancelled to muffles. It’s surprisingly peaceful in here and he starts to understand why she stays inside so much.

His hands grow cold from the melting ice in her cup. As he makes his way to her mini fridge once again, he hears a loud voice from outside the door, some are cheering, and then the feedback from a mic follows seconds later—_and where did they store a mic in the break room?_

As he turns back to the office’s door to see what had happened outside, the phone on Ms. Watson’s desk vibrates from a call, and he stops, stares. Her phone vibrates and the condensation from her empty cup wets and freezes his fingers and Peter stops in his tracks....glances to the heavy door, strains to decipher the commotion outside....

Her phone rings again.

Dashing to her desk, he turns it over; a name is saved as the ID—a man’s home Peter want heard of before. He listens again for the any signs approaching the door, when there aren’t approaching footsteps he takes a look around her desk, at the bookshelves behind it and and how untidy they have become as if shelved in a rush, in a panic.

Heaving a sigh, Peter ignores his urge to snoop and goes to refill her cup.

When he’s going towards the doors again, Ms. Watson’s phone rings. This time Peter goes to her desk without hesitation and sets the cup down on a cleared space. Ignoring her phone, he sifts through the notes atop her desk, skims notes from conference meetings, ones that contain names of people and phone numbers and dollar signs; in the top corner of one page is a grocery list while below are bullet points about ways to improve her company and criticism. On paper, there’s drawn devil horns and tail coming out of the same name that was just calling her phone.

He opens her desk drawers and shifts through spare pens, notebooks, coins, and binders. He takes one out to skim through: inside it’s printouts about the company’s sells up to three years ago. Peter doesn’t yet know what he can use this information for but he takes precautions and pictures with his phone just in case, and then there’s a _calling_, a warning in the forefront of his consciousness that rings siren-volume alarms for him to _leave_.

Hurriedly putting the binder back, he snatches up the cup (forgetting the ring of condensation left, and therefore the evidence of his snooping) and is heading towards the door when it swings open—a man with a fresh hair cut announcing for Peter to “_Hurry up! The CEO is doing karaoke!”_

But it’s less of the drunken performance that some predicted: Ms. Michelle Watson stands beside Jasmine Freeman and the small flat-screen TV brought in the break room, she struggling to read the lyrics in time to the melody of the song. And she isn’t a _breathtaking_ singer, Peter finds, but she isn’t _bad_ even though she lags and is slightly off key.

When she notices Peter’s reentry, Ms. Watson waves him closer, takes the cup from his hand as she continues on crooning along to an electro-pop song.

Her assistant backsteps to stand in the doorway of the break room and behind the gathered onlookers, squints at her performance and slowly pads his cellphone inside his pocket, trying to decipher if her slanted stance is from the effects of intoxication or if she truly doesn’t like being in front of crowds of people—and she says as such, mock-scolding Jasmine at the end of the song before Jasmine playfully forces the CEO to sing one final song. This next one is from a Disney movie, Peter knows, and he can’t help but stare, noticing and comparing the differences and changes in character over time since their first meeting.

Caught up in watching her try not to sway too much to the enjoyment of the melody, periodically sipping spiked soda, and trying not to look like she’s enjoying it way too much, he doesn’t realize he’s _grinning_ until Catherine bumps his hip and points it out, sobering him up immediately.

“She’s kind of cool—if she wanted to be,” the short woman observes. “I hear she’s working you like a dog.”

Peter slides his hands into his pants pockets, giving a small shrug. “Nah, not really.” It's a lie.

He suddenly feels out of place, like he’s looking at and talking about something he _shouldn’t_.

“Oh. Well that’s only what I’ve been _told_. People around here _talk_, so you can imagine the amount of gossip that travels. Can’t trust everything you hear one-hundred percent.”

Peter nods with understanding but something about what she said doesn’t sit right with him in .

“But from what it’s worth, I don’t blame her for how harsh she is. Not entirely.” Catherine is watching the performance again, arms folded again. “Especially with what this place had gone through.”

His attention perks up. “Wait—_what_ happened?” he fakes cluelessness.

The karaoke song is coming to a close. Jasmine pulls Ms. Watson into a side hug and comes close to loudly belting the final repeat of the song’s chorus.

“Some time ago an anonymous tip gave a detailed letter to the local big news press that there was a large money laundry scheme involving this company and like three others. It was about ways of how to cheat the system, basically, and the consumers. It was a list of names that the CEO worked to cover it up. So, I—and lots of people here—think it was from someone who used to work with the company. The only problem is _who_ it was. Like, someone currently here or someone who was fired or who had relations...but my money is on it being someone who was fired from here or a bitter relative.”

Now Peter’s arms are crossed and he’s frowning. “What makes you think the CEO would want to cover it up? This business is beyond successful.”

“Yeah but imagine you’ve _just_ inheriting it and a few years in, _that_ happens. Not to mention there was _big_ competition for her position, some people who wanted it had connections and were _related_ to others in the business.”

At the front of the small gathered audience still in the break room, the song finishes and a low applause is given. Jasmine gives half of a bow and Michelle Watson downs the rest of her cup’s contents, tosses it in a trash bin, and exits to her office doors with a dismissal that “That is enough fun for me.”

“Do you _know_ any of them?”

Catherine shakes her head. “Only one of them who had interned with her at the same time—a young lady—_then_, I suppose she was. She doesn’t work here anymore. I heard there was a fallout.”

“What for?”

“Dunno.”

The energy in the room dissipates rapidly. Catherine and Peter step out of the doorway as, little by little, coworkers return to their desks, some taking small platters of the remainder of food with them.

“Do you remember her name? Or where she works now?”

“Harley. Hardy something,” Catherine thinks aloud. “Alexa—no. Fiona Hardy, I think.”

Michelle Watson calls for her assistant to meet in her office right away and Peter catches himself from cursing out loud.

“But haven’t heard about her since she stormed out. Sorry, Peter.”

He thanks Catherine for her help regardless and privately hopes that he doesn’t look _nervous_ or _obvious_ as he enters the CEO’s office, hands still in his pockets.

Michelle’s words are calm and barely slurred when ordering him to “Come and sit.” He does—immediately, obediently, and a brow of hers raises in response. She clears her throat.

Mentally, Peter’s ready for her to rip into him, to scold and berate him about his breech of confidentiality, the breech in privacy and going through her belongings before driving it home and making him admit what he found, if he was pleased by his finds. ...But she doesn’t.

She doesn’t.

“I got your email and just wanted to tell you that you did a _great_ job on it...and _thank you_. It’s legible and neat which is a _big help_ also.”

And Peter feels the wave of relief wash over him. “Thank you,” is breathed in a sigh in time that he catches the ring of condensation left on her desk. As she continues to talk—about what more she has planned, about what she has in store for him to do, with the boosted morale from comments from Jasmine—he doesn’t think she’s _noticed_. And he’s _glad_ she doesn’t notice when he swipes the wet ring from the desk with his sleeve when she isn’t looking. He forces a smile, listens to her words beginning to slur slightly now, having finished her umpteenth cup, and he wonders if she should either go home or take a nap. But Peter remembers her _temperament_ and the question catches on his tongue and he swallows it and he just watches her flyaway hairs slowly jump out of place and curl in the air.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Leave a comment on ao3 if you like this! Reblog on Tumblr to spread the word and love!_
> 
> _Send a prompt to my Tumblr if you want to see more chapters (leaving comments is also motivation that will help get more chapters out)_


	4. The one where MJ invites Peter over for dinner

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Chapter prompt: peter goes to michelle’s apartment to drop off some important documents and she invites him in for dinner.**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Chapters and story are driven by prompts sent to my Tumblr writing blog. Those prompts are rearranged to be in timeline order._

Peter spends all of his three-day weekend working from home: working for a lead, a sign, a callback; for his phone to beep in alarm at a criminal attack and he gas the knee-jerk reaction about going out and after the crook, then receives an update that the local police or Spider-Man are underway.

He sits hunched over papers and at his computer, hangs lists and sticky notes on his wall—on one bedroom wall, some notes are potential leads, others suspicions; some notes have pushpins and colored string connecting each other; on a tack-board, the sticky notes and torn shreds of paper are swiftly scribbled details or names or numbers or office titles, little connections that he’s working undercover to solving the case of the weasel causing Cedill Enterprise’s criminal activity. There have been undercover cops who’ve already been hired to look into the crimes as well, Peter found out, and then advised by another employee that Peter should keep his head out of the criminal case but he silently refuses to.

He’s partially sure that the _employee_ was in fact another undercover cop. He's absolutely certain that he isn't going to follow the advice at all.

All of his weekend, Peter Parker sips quickly brewed coffee with sugar, and his hair is un-brushed, un-styled, and outside it’s raining heavily, creating a muggy mood. He stays cooped up in his small apartment doing paperwork, still refusing to forge his boss’s signature, and he’s waiting for an order of Chinese takeout to reach his doorstep when the series of numbers of the _exact person_ he’d been thinking about lights up his cellphone’s screen. He’s recently changed his ringtone to a stock tune after one incident when he forgot to and the ringer left on and the air trumpets of Captain America’s theme played. (He’d been embarrassed, of course, it happening around several colleagues and his boss not too far away.)

Unexpecting the phone call, he jumps a little yanked from deep concentration. The caller ID name is very formal and in white letters above the number. He removes the pencil from between his lips and hesitates, swallows thickly, slowly slides a thumb across its screen to answer.

“Hello?”

Somewhere in the city, his food is en route. The deliverer will ring his doorbell and Peter’s window will rattle from booming thunder. On the phone, he’s asked to bring over some of the paperwork he’d conveniently just finished looking at, and he’ll wrap up in a jacket against the onslaught of wind and freezing rain and put his food in the refrigerator for later.

His boss tells that she can wait for the next few hours for him to arrive if he’s currently busy; she doesn’t mind waiting.

(She’s good at waiting. She’s had a lot of practice at it.)

* * *

Living alone is just as bad and perplexing as Michelle concluded it to be in her college years and early twenties.

With the loneliness, her laundry is astonishingly always accomplished on a routine-like two-week basis and her sink doesn’t get disgustingly filled, which is nice, but there are also a lot of _trade-overs_ and suspiciously intrusive telemarketers, depressingly invasive questions about her love life—or lack thereof—and she often falls asleep with the sound of music left on repeat, and she still hasn’t gotten that pet she once planned to. She gets tension in her chest when she thinks about this; she gets pounding aggravation headaches when she has to encounter with the same nosy questionnaires and comments in public.

Currently, she’s been writing a proposal when phoning her personal assistant, procrastinating on putting the final touches on a grant that is needed to be sent off soon—it completely influences by the feared response in reaction to the decline in her company’s reputation.

She’s had to explain this her parents, too, when they’ve called, and three other board members, and slowly to a criticizing empty-nested old neighbor, and Michelle doesn’t have _time_ to fit things in her schedule that are for the long-haul—there just isn’t _room_ for things like dwelling on bridges or why she doesn’t, _can’t_ find time for _relationships_.

But it’s all a lie, one she tells to stop the questions. It’s a lie that’s become so routine and practiced that it’s bleeding into being believed.

But then again, what’s it to _them_ because it isn’t any of their _business_, frankly. And similarly, what’s it to _her_ about the instigating, petty criticism and judgment? She doesn’t _care_. She’s fine, and she’s calm, and she has published college thesis’s under her name, runs her own company, has an Amazon Alexa and a multi-speed vibrator and she’s _well off_ if she does say so herself. She doesn't have a problem; she doesn’t have any problem she can’t easily overcome, she believes.

She thinks about Felicia. She thinks about other relationships she’s lost or have withered away.

Breaking from a trance, Michelle’s phone buzzes at an incoming text message right as she’s standing at her stove and steps back to avoid popping olive oil in a pan: it’s a text message that her assistant will be arriving in the next thirty minutes. In a message before, she corrected him to not meet her at the office because she’s avoiding it that day (but she doesn’t say that _explicitly_).

Fish sears in her pan. There’s a pot of boiling angel hair pasta going. A bottle of wine sits on the countertop, its cap loosened. Michelle moves to sit in a kitchen chair with her knees to her chest as she texts back a response. She takes a drink straight from the bottle, only a quarter of liquid left.

* * *

Peter arrives within a flurry of rain, strong wind, wet hair, and is twenty minutes later than he said he would.

Michelle points this out; she does this a lot, he’s noticed.

His excuse is that he got lost, having never had to meet his boss at their _homes_ before. Also, it’s very wet and freezing outside. But since neither of them are exactly vulnerable to the elements, Michelle allows him inside...to tread water and gravel on her polished wood flooring and heads straight for her carpet. She hurries ahead to stop him and retrieves a large towel for him to dry with—Peter shivers into it, and hangs his coat on the spare mounted copper hooks between her keys and the front door.

The winds howl outside.

Michelle trudges past to return to the fish now burning on the stove top, leaving Peter to wring his fingers and stand awkwardly and inquisitive in her spacious living room.

“Don’t touch anything,” she calls at the same time his finger is running across the spines of books on her talk, dark wooden bookshelf and an abstract-shaped glass figurine. At her voice, Peter jumps, nearly knocking the figurine down, steadying it in time. His chest is pounding when he turns, guilty, as she calls out: “You can leave the paperwork on the table.”

Inhaling a steadying breath, Peter navigates to her kitchen, taking his time to gaze at the two family photographs hanging. Takes out a binder wrapped in a plastic grocery bag tucked inside his sweater worn underneath his jacket. Michelle leans against the stove, standing in a normal pair of jeans and a nice pink shirt. Her hair is tied up. Peter wonders if she’d gotten dressed for this purpose only, assuming she hadn’t gone into work today.

“I wasn’t able to sign with your signature,” he begins, and the shoulder sag he earns in response puts him off. “Sorry…I just didn’t feel _comfortable_ doing….” He stops, changes the sentence. “Were you really busy?”

Michelle sighs. She’s carefully trying to flip the fish without it falling apart. “I’m just…” She sighs again. “Yeah. Kind of. Just haven’t been the _best_ lately, but it’s nothing.”

“Oh. I’m—sorry. I’m sorry. Is there anything—something I can—”

“My fish died.” She sounds disappointed.

Peter reels a little. “Your—your _fish?!_”

“Last week. I won him like a month before and it had been healthy and all but it just suddenly _died_ on me.” She has a bad thumb, she calls it, having tried it with plants and then a fish, but they all withered under her care. Noticing he’s staring at her in a _questionable_ sort of way, she asks, “What?”

He wants to point out that she’s _eating_ fish but he refrains. Instead, Peter shakes his head, opening the binder to distract himself by pointing out the tasks he’s done inside it, but she’s persistent in controlling the conversation.

“What was _that_ look?”

“Nothing...It was nothing.”

“Yes it was,” she argues, somewhere between mock offended and a giggle. “You were _judging_ me, weren't you? What, you don’t like fishes?”

Wearing his emotions clearly, Peter fails to lie that he had meant it as a different way. “I swear! I wasn’t judging, Ms. Watson.”

At the name she noticeably _stops_. The smile that had been growing shrinks and her posture, once relaxed, changes, growing rigid, and her voice looses vigor when she mumbles at a volume Peter shouldn’t have been able to catch: “Watson.... Right....”

And he wants to feel guilty—because she’s uncharacteristically _silent_ now, and honestly, that the air before had felt _different_ and more relaxed and even _friendly_ had been nice. He wants to feel guilty as she formally, robotically thanks him for the paperwork and instructs him to hang the towel he’s used on the back of one of her kitchen chairs; and that “The front door is back down that hall. ...I’ll see you in the office on Monday, Parker.” Peter _wants_ to feel _guilty_ as he does what she instructs and is then leaving the kitchen as she pours the pasta out into a colander. He _wants_ to, as the lights overhead flicker dramatically for seconds as he stands in the kitchen archway before they go out and Michelle squeaks. He _wants_ to feel _guilty_ when she spills the hot water on her arm in freight and he rushes over to help by throwing his slightly damp towel around her lower arm, she hissing in pain, and thunder roars overhead. He doesn’t feel _guilty_, but he feels _something else_ as Michelle thanks him, curses the storm outside, and then he offers to help which she curtly turns down. Peter insists that “I don’t have anything better to do tonight,” and smiles. And as if on cue, his stomach gurgles loudly.

He rode an Uber over and doubts that any will arrive timely in this storm now.

“Well I can make you a plate. It’s the least I can do right now.” Peter wants to object but she interjects with: “You’re obviously hungry, Parker.”

He snaps his jaw closed, unable to argue.

Michelle empties the remaining two swallows from the bottle into a hot pan. “Do you like wine sauce?”

* * *

Ms. Watson isn’t a chef.

Peter’s stomach thinks she’s one, though.

The pair eat off of forest green stoneware plates seated across from each other at her small square-shaped dinner table, her apartment condo lit by candlelight. It’s dark outside, made worse by the clouds.

Peter comments that _The Lady And The Tramp_ comes to mind about their setting. Michelle admits that, despite there being fish instead of meatballs, “I never pegged you as a Disney fan.”

He smiles, closemouthed. When he swallows, he answers, “I used to live with my aunt and we had a collection.”

Ms. Michelle Watson isn’t a chef but when she invites an unopened bottle of wine and pulls out the cork effortlessly, telling that it would pair well with the meal, Peter politely declines initially. He watches Ms. Watson fill her decorated wine glass halfway, droplets catch onto her thumb when she jumps at a window-rattling clap of thunder, and then as she tentatively licks it off—then, Peter changes his mind, mainly because he wants to believe that he’s _losing_ his mind. He doesn't agree with his mind although it’s been in cahoots with his racing pulse for some time now...

With him requesting permission, they share the bottle under a very non-romantic dinner candlelight.

The rain pelts the windows heavily. The curtains are opened and the streetlights softly illuminating the surrounding street area reach the living room.

Over conversation, Michelle reveals that she used to take a cooking class in high school, and then she worked at an IKEA for nearly two years. Peter finds out that her favorite comfort food is meatloaf and grilled asparagus—which he wrinkles his nose and goes, “_Really?!_” Up until a few months ago, Michelle has started buying more wine—about _why_ she's done it, she carefully dances around the hinted question.

Over dinner, Peter smiles at her story and he stabs a fork into his food at the detail that this _isn't_ a date.

There are candles set up on various surfaces throughout her large studio apartment. The Uber app is still loading on Peter’s phone. Their shoes are lined together on the tile near her front door; his jacket and sweater hang on hooks nearest the door; and he’s in a simple t-shirt which she pokes fun at for the corny typography that’s a mock of Da Vinci’s _Vitruvian Man_, and the air is lighter, lax, and _cordial_. Peter wonders how long it will last.

Across the table, Michelle covers her mouth in a laugh over a memory of a French professor who cursed about everything wrong with American food. Peter shares a story about how eggnog came up through his nose while laughing at a Christmas party. She tells how she got involved with picketers to protest other picketers on a college campus. He illustrates how he remembers being driven to the hospital for choking on dry ramen noodles.

The shared company is _vivacious_ and _affable_.

Michelle isn’t a chef, not a long shot, she affirms. Even so, Peter is _baffled_ when she raises her second half-full glass of wine in a toast (he shocked that she’s not even _closely_ tipsy) and he has to press a hand to his palpitating chest when he realizes how she looks when she _laughs_ at his jokes and comments, and when she wipes the lipstick off on a paper towel because “It’s late at night and it’s going to be _a pain_ to get this lipstick off of the glass anyway;” and when her hands flutter across his shoulders, damp from the rain, and rubs a new, dry towel into them as she exits back to the kitchen to wash her dishes, Peter holds a hand to the middle of his chest and has a tad of color rushes to his face. He chugs down the rest of his wine, having still been nursing his first fill.

His pulse is speeding, watching her relight a candle on her living room coffee table that’s flickers out, and watching as the strands of hair falling loose from her high bun and the little drunken hand twirl she gives.

He imagines what would happen when they return to the office. This, he does feel bad about.

* * *

Two hours later, Peter requests an Uber. He and Ms. Watson hug for the first time, ever, when he has to leave—and it isn’t a halfhearted half-hug, the action coming automatic and the two don’t _realize_ until it has to pull away...and then it's transformed into a slightly awkward half-embrace. Michelle watches him climb in the car from her window and gives a wave that Peter returns, his hand clenches his chest again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Leave a comment on ao3 if you like this! Reblog on Tumblr to spread the word and love!_
> 
> _Send a prompt to my Tumblr if you want to see more chapters (leaving comments is also motivation that will help get more chapters out)_


	5. The one where MJ dresses like she's going to the store but runs into Peter

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Chapter prompt: michelle needs some her time, so, she goes out to see a movie and has a run in with peter and aunt may.**  

> 
> While this wasn't the first that Felicia is featured in this series, it's the first she comes in when this is put in chronological order, like this is being uploaded in

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Chapters and story are driven by prompts sent to my Tumblr writing blog. Those prompts are rearranged to be in timeline order._

When Michelle Watson leaves her apartment late that morning, lazily dressed in a pair of drawstring pants, a sweater and scarf, strolling out into the bright sun unabashed and exposed in one of her rare moments. Likewise in one of her rarely fully relaxed moments, she doesn’t have a particular plan made for the day or destination pre-set in mind but she has somewhat of a goal made—albeit poorly constructed. Michelle exits the building of her condo home on the second day of her weekend off, and it feels like it’s been _forever_ since feeling this free—it’s followed by her ungraceful tripping around a dog zig-zagging on its leash, and then almost stumbling into a fucking _parking meter_. A man on a mo-ped in a parking spaces pauses to watch her narrow misses of public embarrassment. When catching his incredulous stare Michelle sniffs, slightly sneers, slides her dark sunglasses on to conceal her embarrassment and walks off with a high-held nose.

A shiver runs across her shoulders from the chilly air. She’d been under-prepared for the weather but continues on, determined.

It’s early spring, the winds carrying on the last chills of winter, and it’s half past one in the afternoon in the first of the month of April. Michelle had gotten her day started late.

There’s police sirens echoing in the distance along with other noise that fill the area residing just outside the city’s core: a child shrieking in joy, squirrels scampering, a bike’s bell, a whoop, a holler, a vehicle’s horn and its wheels swerving over asphalt.

Her thumb slides across randomly selected song from Today’s Top Hits playing through Michelle’s earphones and she's like a normal civilian again. Nodding her head in a semi-timed rhythm to the attractive beats and vocals, she tries to take the day as it goes, following the advice to ‘relax, and it will chart its own course’—that was read on the back of an energy stone spontaneously purchase two weeks ago from a university student. It’s now shelved on her industrial entertainment center.

On previous self-appointed days off, she’d spent hours at a bakery one morning and thirty minutes at a gym; she’s had dinner in a nice Dominican restaurant and read through half of a novel in a single afternoon. When she’s able to put on a movie, usually the second half of the movie watches _her_ as she falls asleep.

But those have all just been hours taken out of her work day, not an honest off-day. So as a chance and to help pass the time, today she was able to make a simple breakfast of eggs, buttered toast, and grape juice after woken up by an email alert—it had been from work about more paperwork. She responded whom to forward the paperwork to instead of waiting for her to return. She’d watched the morning news and sat in shared confusion with the news anchor as the previous red-suited Spider-Man appears on screen, swinging in the background to assist the current black-suited Spider-Man against team of powered armed convicts. The news station cuts to commercial.

Her morning ended as Michelle washes her dishes and showering before heading out into the city. But while under the water, she thinks about the Spider-Men and daydreams, wondering if she were to have abilities like theirs—to sense and hear and _know_—then she wouldn’t have the reputation of her inherited company in danger. Maybe she wouldn’t even _be_ in this position in the first place.

Michelle secures the shower cap on her head and around her ears. She thinks about the Spider-Men, about her retired predecessor, about the small hand-notes of reports she’s received, about her own future. And, she thinks about Felicia Hardy.

* * *

Dressed in the most unflattering ill-suited outfit for a CEO, she dresses like she’s unexpecting to run into anyone familiar—and she _isn’t_, pretty sure that everyone is at work today. Michelle isn’t _expecting_ to see _anyone_ from work. She’d been very careful and chose this day off because it had the least likely chance to run into any employees.

But she forgot _one_ recent dividing factor.

Which is why Michelle has a brief but heart-dropping run-in that’s a four-second-long stand-off in the middle of a bustling sidewalk on her way to see what theatre tickets are left for purchase. Michelle grips the shoulder strap of her bag a little tighter. She doesn’t quite _glare_ but she isn’t _smiling_ either—mainly because she’s out with no makeup, her hair barely brushed and pulled up and away from her face, her clothes frumpy and unflattering, and _mainly_ because she’s standing feet away from Mr. Peter Parker who’s leaving the same food truck lot she introduced him to three months ago, an older woman at his side. They both had been laughing; they aren’t anymore, Peter’s dying coldly while the other woman is gradually understanding the situation.

The sun’s blazing overhead. A chilling gust of wind blows. Michelle’s tongue sticks to the roof of her mouth.

It’s a brief standoff that goes mostly unnoticed because the woman at Peter’s side stops to rummage through her purse and Peter’s holding her food in one hand and his own in his other, and he looks…_bad_, Michelle wants to say. Unprofessional. Unconsidered. …At least he isn’t wearing those damn jeans with a suit jacket like he assumed what their "business casual" dress was.

But in this situation, Michelle is a hypocrite.

Wordlessly, Peter hands the woman back her red-and-white-striped paper tray, and as they continue walking again, he runs a hand through the mess that’s his hair, partially hidden beneath the green hood of his sweater. The woman beside him still doesn’t seem to notice...

And Peter knows he shouldn’t look, because if he looks, May will look, and if May looks...

But Michelle is walking away now, though still their paths will intersect anyway and by now they’ve already _seen_ each other so there’s no real _avoiding_ at this point, and Peter he knows he should say _something_, because it’s polite and expected and Michelle’s his _boss_, technically, and it’s best to stay on her good side, secondly…but maybe he _shouldn’t_ say _anything_ with his chest clenching and speeding in indecisive anxiety, and Peter doesn’t really _hear_ his aunt May still talking...

May notices anyway.

Without looking Michelle directly in the eyes for long (which she’s grateful for, too) Peter blurts out an equally improper “Hello, Ms. Watson” and forces a grin in Michelle’s direction.

She pauses....shuffles on her feet. He smiles and she inwardly curses this terribly executed avoidance. _Fuck._

For the quick beat of a following second, Peter thinks Michelle’s scrutinizing him. She blinks and her gaze is sharp and piercing, eyeing the jean jacket worn over his green hoodie. Then there’s that expecting _frown_ to her face.

“Mr. Parker.” The returning greet is quick and to the point, paired with a curt nod. This is her day off and she isn’t prepared to be seen, so she desperately wants to get away as soon as possible.

May, on the other hand, doesn’t seem to be on the same wavelength or doesn’t consider.

At Michelle’s response, May pipes up an unconcealed, “Ms. Watson? As in, _the_ Ms. Watson?” She then goes off in excited storytelling about how grateful they are that Michelle was able to introduce May’s nephew to a connection at a brief meeting that had potential to greatly boost his career—a Dr. Connors, May blurts, some scientist that was looking for funding but whom Michelle herself hadn’t spoken to. May had greatly misunderstood Peter’s story and isn’t listening to his hints for her to _stop talking_. Then May’s infiltrating Michelle’s personal bubble to pull her hand from her side and shakes it enthusiastically, graciously, and speaking so.

At May’s side, Peter is looking equally parts embarrassed, like a child listening to his parent spill every bit of information, and he’s equally parts mortified by his aunt’s blabbering about his career and how much he’s shared about it, about the snippets of information he’s told about _her_—Michelle. It’s all good things shared but May considered it _extraordinary_ to have connections so far up in a business latter, with a nice boss to boot.

“It’s always flattery,” May informs of her nephew’s talks glorifying his boss. “All good things. His eyes always light up.” She leans in a little and winks at that last statement.

It’s meant in play but Michelle still swallows nervously.

Horrified, Peter grips May’s arm and tugs her back to his side with a strained smile, gritting through his teeth. “That’s enough, Aunt May. We should go. We should go _now_.”

And he _knows_ he shouldn’t look at his boss after this. He knows—he shouldn’t—he _can’t_ after this embarrassing blunder opening. May’s half-empty beer bottle rests in the crook of his elbow. (It’s not that his aunt is tipsy, because she isn’t and has a strong stomach too, but her lips are loosened by the beer and she’d been too relaxed when she started speaking.) Peter feels his ears beginning to warm so he refuses to look his boss in the eye. But Michelle’s standing hardly five feet away and they're already near the line for the ticket-window, and, for which he thinks is probably a once-in-a-lifetime event, notices she isn’t dressed up—that, _and_ he can practically _feel_ Michelle’s smile radiating as he focuses on anything but her face.

May continues to talk and Peter doesn’t look.

Michelle’s laughing. Of course she’s laughing.

Peter looks.

Her favorite designer sunglasses are sliding from the tangles atop her head, and she’s clearly hiding her quiet chuckling behind the hand pressed against her mouth. The grey scarf wrapped around her neck is of thick yarn and it’s long, hanging to the waistband of her pants. Peter blinks. He’s close enough to see that all she has on is lipstick and—_maybe_—is that _eyeshadow_? He takes in how haphazardly her brown hair is pulled back by a scrunchie, loose curls a halo in the sunlight; takes in her light-brown skin and high cheekbones and a face that’s just as _fascinating_ as she’s beautiful—

Wait.

Peter’s mouth goes dry. He blinks again

May’s studded earrings reflect emerald green. Michelle makes a comment about Peter’s loose lips, about how he swings between speaking so freely or not at all.

He finds it surprisingly stings.

Of course it stings.

Michelle wraps her extra-long scarf wrapped around her wrists as she tells how May’s nephew is stubborn yet good working, and that he’s briefly mentioned his aunt before over dinner. Michelle doesn’t go into detail, but still May’s brows rise and her lip pouts in exaggerated fondness, and gives her nephew a _look_ that he still isn’t going to look her in the eyes to see either.

“Oh! Dinner? I didn’t know about that. It must have been fancy,” May _smirks_.

Peter rolls his eyes.

Michelle’s smile is more of polite than amused, and it’s near _painful_ to watch.

At that same moment, Peter pipes up: “Ms. Watson doesn’t like those restaurants that overprice everything for small amounts.”

May speaks that she already likes his boss—as if this is a romantic set-up instead of a coincidental meeting.

Michelle’s strained smile turns to him. “I can speak for myself, _thank you_.”

He squeezes his eyes closed, head bowing, mentally kicking himself.

“And I never _said_ anything about not liking fancy dinners,” Michelle’s arms cross. “Especially if they have good bread…” She then explains to May that she’s partnered with several charities and tries to practice sustainability within the company. That Peter’s chin snaps up at her first sentence about fancy dinners goes unaddressed.

He’s quiet as the conversation continues on without him, as it dwindles, and the line for the ticket-window shortens. Peter is twisting the neck of the beer bottle in his hands. May is talking about something related to past events, a way to impress Michelle, he’s sure, as Michelle wordlessly reaches into her purse for her cellphone and unlocks the screen. May finishes her story and Michelle gives another polite smile, and Peter squints after her as she says goodbyes and hurries for the ticket window.

He gulps down the remaining two-thirds of his beer. His aunt hides her impress.

Michelle waits behind an indecisive woman with sleek hair, pressed clothes, and who’s face she doesn’t immediately see. Michelle fiddles on her cellphone, waiting her turn. She decides to purchase a ticket for a show she saw advertised on the theatre’s website, and proceeds to the restroom. It isn’t until she exits, heading towards the door to her assigned theatre, does she stop cold in her tracks for a second stand-off, coming face to face with an old friend—_an ex_—an ex a lot of things: an ex friend, an ex coworker, an ex employee, an ex follower on social media, an ex partner in crime, an ex—

Felicia had been an ex “sister,” almost. Practically. And as she turns, threateningly slow and smoothly, Michelle feels like she’s being scrutinized like one.

She had been the one in front of Michelle at the window outside.

She’s also seen Michelle at her worse as well as her best, so the other doesn’t feel _too _embarrassed about her attire in front of Felicia. But still, Michelle would have felt better to be more appropriately dressed.

Felicia stalks around Michelle like a wary feline, her eyes dragging slowly from Michelle’s quickly chosen baby-doll shoes, to her lazily fashioned hair. Michelle stands her ground, equally vigilant. Felicia sniffs.

Finally, she mutters a rude acknowledgment of “Watson.”

Michelle answers with equal vigor and vileness, “Hardy.”

Felicia frowns.

Michelle blinks. Her grip on her purse tightens.

The women stare at each for a long, long moment, features carefully arranged in blank, impossible-to-read masks—and then Felicia’s lips twitch. Suddenly, like a light-switch, a bright smile lights her face. Michelle hears a small family entering through the entrance doors before Felicia speaks.

“I heard about your job. That’s so unfortunate.” It’s fake sympathy as bitter as the lemonade she once tried to make from scratch, horrible judgement of substituting brown sugar instead of cane sugar.

Michelle doesn’t reply.

“It was all over the news,” she continues, face and tone bright and devoid of any venom. “I just can’t imagine,” and a hand raises to her chest, sympathetically, and Michelle wants to rip off the brightly colored pin on the other’s blouse—it was one Michelle gave to Felicia for her birthday.

Michelle wants to rip it off, and she _regrets_ ever gifting it.

“I mean. The fact that that was going on behind the boss’s _back_, and they never _knew_,” Felicia presses. “_Who knows_ what else could have happened?” She mingles the company’s name with words like “promiscuity” and “gambling” and “stealing” in a light tone as the parents and two children walk past and to a different showing; Felicia says it purposely loud to earn the sneer from one of the two mothers.

Michelle glares. It wasn’t her fault, and Felicia knows. She _knows_ that Felicia knows. And yet still...

“You have been there as long as I have. I knew just as much as _you_ did.”

Felicia clicks her tongue. “But _see_ here…” A long nail curls under her chin as she steps around Michelle, clearly toying with her. “This is the difference between us: it didn’t happen _under my_ authority. It happened under yours, _boss_. But…” She stops herself. Shakes her head. “You wouldn’t listen anyway.”

Michelle’s hands ball into fists. “Stop the bullshit, Felicia.” The other tries to play coy and Michelle isn’t having it. “You don’t need a fucking audience; everyone already knows. And before you have anything else _smart_ to say,” she steps closer, threatening, “I’ve already hired _investigators_ that are looking into it.”

One of Felicia’s stenciled brows raise in apparent impress. “Have you, MJ?”

Music begins playing from inside one of the theaters—the one Michelle bought a showing for. She blows a breath of hot air through her nose as she starts to turn to catch her showing before the doors lock. “One of us has to be responsible,” Michelle says and she can tell that that burned.

Felicia scoffs. “Fair enough.” Her smile isn’t as strong as before, hanging limply by the ends.

Michelle glances back to study the other briefly, gaze flitting from Felicia’s eyes to her mouth to her painted nails and then narrowing slightly when she rises back up to that plastic guise. To her, Michelle is so transparent—Michelle believes she can read Felicia like another book, another fault that Felicia had often called fault to.

Without another word, Michelle stomps to the entrance where the show she’s paid for will begin playing in the next five minutes.

Felicia raises her voice pointedly so Michelle doesn’t miss but keeps it low enough to not echo in the lobby: “And you thought you were the smarter one. See where that got you?”

Michelle takes two more steps inside the room when she stops. Above her, the EXIT sign glows an annoying muted red. Covered in the darkness of the entrance to the theatre, she debates whether to retort back—to even turn around and continue—there’s bile in her words bubbling up her throat, choking he. However, several seconds when Michelle decides to return to the lobby to retort, Felicia is nowhere to be found.

The ending to Michelle’s time off was spent resenting and brooding within the dark room of a theatre performance.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Leave a comment on ao3 if you like this! Reblog on Tumblr to spread the word and love!_
> 
> _Send a prompt to my Tumblr if you want to see more chapters (leaving comments is also motivation that will help get more chapters out)_


	6. The one where they start their pretend-engagement

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Chapter prompt: “Explain it to me again - why do we need to pretend to be married?”**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Chapters and story are driven by prompts sent to my Tumblr writing blog. Those prompts are rearranged to be in timeline order._

“Explain it to me again—_why_ do we need to pretend to be married?”

“Because they’re a bunch melodramatic, rich, pompous, foot funguses who would look at anyone—yes, which includes me _and_ you—and spray us with two week old soured milk without giving a second though or because they simply thought it was _fun_.” She’s applied strangely accented perfume and is currently sliding a stick of vibrant nude color across her lips and leans closer and closer to the bathroom mirror until Peter thinks she'll either hit the glass or her lipstick will snap from the force of her grip.

Michelle's roused vexation has been felt, within the past thirty minutes, filling up the air of her large condo apartment home.

“But you’re the _head of this company_,” Peter chuckles bitterly, sarcastically. It gets stuck in his throat.

Michelle caps her lipstick, runs manicured fingers over her gelled-down hairline as a double-check and thinks she would be side-eyed and called all types of derogatory nicknames if she were to style her edge hairs like her second in command, Jasmine, does on the regular; if Michelle had hairs long enough to style in that way.

“Yeah, well, you know what’s happened to the_ headquarters building_.” She means about the scandals of fraud reported to have been happening behind her back, and is the reason Peter was pulled into this mess in the first place.

During moments of inhibition Michelle went to visit the CEO at a partnering branch, one whom she has sought advice from, before and after Michelle inherited her CEO career.

Reflecting in her bathroom mirror, her upper lip curls in disdain at the glitter and champagne pink of her floor-length dress. “And as far as they’re convinced,” she continues, “I’m just some bottom-feeder who was just _lucky enough_ to climb her way to the top and now intrudes their ‘_sacred high class’._”

“Isn’t that a _good_ thing?”

“Not if ‘_Daddy’_ didn’t have a six-figure salary and couldn’t pay your way through medical or law school.” Her face is fully painted with makeup, something she doesn’t do daily.

She doesn’t reveal that attenders at this party she’s invited to have also used terms like _weasel_ and _ pity case_ or that Michelle’s career was solely achieved for _‘diversity.’_

“They think better of you if it seems like you have your life together, which can help with connections, bonuses, good word from your employees. You know; the works. It just makes you _look good_. Plus I said I'll add on a bonus to your current incoming bonus, remember?”

She then turns and stalks out of the bathroom to where he’s sitting, fully and fancily dressed, at the edge of her bed. Together, they look like an immaculately groomed prime-aged couple.

To Peter, Michelle looks—well, she probably has an idea by now, he thinks.

Exhaling a deep breath, he watches her face as she approaches, glades her fingers across the lapel of his garnet red suit, smoothing it. Then, she brushes his hair, and Peter tries to not lean into her palm when it slides down to pause at his ear, just barely cupping his cheek. But he fails. And just before she realizes, Michelle’s phone alerts that it’s time to leave; she pulls away.

“Oh! I almost forgot!”

And he watches her rummage through her desk drawers to find a small box. Peter’s chest vehemently—deceptively—bursts into flutter as she pulls out and extends a marriage ring to him. But the feeling is extinguished upon remembering and hearing her next words.

“These are rentals. So don’t loose them.” She slides the second, skinnier ring onto her own finger.

Peter takes the other from her with more hesitance than he’s willing to admit.

“You okay?”

He nods, is silent and staring at the jeweled wedding ring. Peter’s almost astonished.

Michelle’s hand on his hair brings his gaze back up to her.

“Thanks for doing this for me.” It sounds sincere. Perhaps the most sincere she’s _ever_ been towards him.

It shocks him.

Peter only nods, again. “Sure.” He catches the flicker of unsurety. “Of course,” follows, more confidently.

And with equally, suddenly mustered confidence, he grabs her arm that’s on his shoulder and brings her hand to his mouth, where he slowly kisses the inside of her wrist.

His eyes are cast down so he doesn’t see the stuttered catch of breath in her chest, the wide and startled look in her eye, or her mouth falling open.

Her cellphone rings at that moment, breaking it and rescuing her from having to say anything of the situation, or anything that could simultaneously contribute to this situation as much as it could also sabotage it.

Michelle jerks her arm back. “We have to leave.” There’s little emotion in her voice—an automatic state she slips into when she attends these functions.

She grabs her keys, clutch, and heads to exit.

Wordlessly, Peter stands to follow. Pauses. Takes a breath, exhales. Smooths the front of the suit she’s let him borrow, the act matches his current struggle to soothing his nerves.

Peter follows after her, closing the door behind him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Leave a comment on ao3 if you like this! Reblog on Tumblr to spread the word and love!_  
  
_Send a prompt to my Tumblr if you want to see more chapters (leaving comments is also motivation that will help get more chapters out)_


	7. The one where they attend their first gala as a fake couple

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Chapter prompt: “What do you mean by leaving?” for the ceo mj au?**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There were two ideas I had as ways to fill this prompt. The first is a short flashback with Michelle and Felicia, peeking into the past from when they were college undergraduates sharing an apartment. The second is a long installment about Michelle and Peter at their first gala together.
> 
> Secondly I want to thank all of you who shared your thoughts and comments about this story! You all don't know how much it means to read your words and it fills my heart knowing you all like it! You all are the backbone to this and are what keeps this fic going! All of your questions are awesome but also spoilers to chapters not reposted yet, lol!
> 
> _Chapters and story are driven by prompts sent to my Tumblr writing blog. Those prompts are rearranged to be in timeline order._

Michelle stampedes into Felicia’s room as it's nearing two in the morning on a Sunday night, frustrated and peeved and _pissed_ more than she’s questioning her apartment roommate’s loud banging and shuffling that awoke her, because if this is like last time when Felicia brought her girlfriend over (not counting the one time she nearly _seduced_ Michelle’s once would-be boyfriend) and because Michelle herself has to wake up in five more hours and she has to _work_, she's more than prepared to fight for peace in the place she pays a third of the rent.

But when she knocks once, twice, enters Felicia's bedroom without request and far too impatient to wait for a response, she doesn't quite care—doesn't quite _register_ the suspicious pose of her roommate caught with one leg pulled out skin-tight black leggings, caught wearing a bodysuit underneath that's lace and also black and something Michelle assumes is nothing but a _costume_. Felicia’s wearing one of her wigs, Michelle catches as Felicia has one hand on her hair, face full of makeup and smudged cat-eye eyeliner and lipstick stain dragging across her left cheek.

Michelle doesn’t ask. She isn’t sure if she _wants_ to know; the other has frozen like a red-handed burglar against the backdrop of city lights and the living room's trailing lighting.

Michelle loudly feels around for the lights-witch before flicking it up to _ON_ and it illuminates the scrapes on Felicia’s elbows and her upper arm and bottom lip that she's going to cover with lipstick come morning-time.

A question about Felicia’s wellbeing is left hanging in the air and unanswered. Instead, Felicia tosses her leggings to a corner and slips passed Michelle to the kitchen. She’s obviously troubled but it’s nearly 4:15 in the morning and Michelle is too exhausted to bring herself to question about it.

Until it’s that following weekend and Michelle picks up the tail ends of a conversation happening at their small circular kitchen table from her bedroom—it’s Felicia, she hears, and a familiar man's voice.

“What do you mean by leaving?” Michelle butts in, rounding the corner, purposefully ignoring how the conversation comes to a halting stop at her appearance.

Felicia's morning greeting smile is forced. On the table are four opened bottles of beer—two empty, one which Felicia holds, and the other has a swig left inside.

At their small crappy apartment table, Felicia shares how she and her guest, the guy—a boyfriend, an associate, or just a friend, Michelle doesn’t think too much of which—are planning to move in together. Michelle’s smile is strained and stressed and faux. She doesn’t try to convince her friend to not go through with it, noting Felicia’s fluctuating moods lately and her own need for peace. Michelle also tries not to think about the guy at their table who has his socks off and his ankles on the table, copying Felicia herself, and Michelle's skin crawls.

Michelle also tries not to think about how she had been smitten with this same guy many months back—that is, until he found out _Felicia_ and Michelle were living together.

* * *

* * *

“What do you mean by leaving?” Peter asks when he hears Michelle mutter while she weaves through the crowd behind him; he’d been smiling in a conversation about science and formulas and amazed attentiveness at the possible opportunity presented by his conversation with a one-armed scientist and his connections with Peter’s late parents. He felt Michelle’s hand flutter across his shoulders as she passes, gaining pace through the lavish crowd. She’d left at the end of her own conversation and had spoken in a volume Peter nearly missed from lack of attention.

Peter politely ends his conversation by promising to meet back up with Dr. Connors in the near future. Nodding, the man turns to join the side of his business partner he's attending with and Peter dashes off to find his date.

She’s squeezing through conversing guests, hurrying for an exit. The ballroom is full and the small spaces and chatter are increasingly getting to Peter but he focuses on Michelle’s fleeting far ahead and directs his attention and focus on catching up with her instead of his oncoming claustrophobia.

Michelle’s hurrying in the direction of a pair of doors leading out to the green, neatly managed lawn. The automatic sprinklers are turning on and she hadn’t answered his beckoned call.

At the fancy gala full of prosperous people and intricate horderves and crystal, Peter nearly _pulls_ Michelle back by the wrist.

Lights reflects off her dangling earrings as she turns, gaze searching, doubtful and discouraged—and then flickers of confusion, irritated, then _anger, _and she snatches her wrist back. She'd been prepared to give a poorly rehashed excuse that she'd rushed out needing fresh air, but upon seeing who stopped her, she swallows her words.

“Ms. Watson…are you…” Peter trails off, not entirely sure how to end the question and instead watches her gather herself, slowly breathe, check her earrings.

Michelle paces in a small circle once. Then bows her head, wraps arms around her lithe waist, cranes her neck back and inhales deeply, and finally sighs. “I want to leave,” she breathes, nearly impossible to hear over the chatter and the music and the water spraying in the background.

Back inside, it’s a lavish, upscale, and ornate gathering the duo is attending, it meant for networking and business deals while incorporating drinking and gossiping just as much. Peter is here on Michelle’s account as a plus-one.

Also, like she explained hours before at her apartment, this all is just way to continue deals set, to make new ones, to probably meet new business partners, and to uphold the brand of whatever work you’re doing—and for CEO Michelle J. Watson, to uphold the nice, clean facade and good word of the company she inherited is the main goal of their attendance, she explained, and to not fall for anyone’s diamond-encrusted flattery.

“It’s dollar store-bought rhinestones anyway,” she told him.

She hadn’t been particularly enthusiastic about anything earlier, Peter remembers from before when they separated so she could converse elsewhere. So her sudden break in her demeanor was greatly unexpected, to say the least.

“What happened back there?” Peter asks loud enough for only her and the chirping grasshoppers to hear. And he watches as she straightens her posture, face stones, raises her chin, and looks just past his head to a subject back inside. He thinks better than to turn around.

“Nothing.” She reaches for his hand. “Nothing at all.” Her sight turns back to him and she smiles as the doors open as an elderly couple leave—Michelle’s entire response is a performance. She backs him inside but they don't step away from the glass doors. “I’m just fine. And you, _honey?_”

His brows wrinkle, confused about her motives. He still doesn’t look behind himself.

Her face blanks in surprise at the reassuring squeeze he gives in return. “We can leave if you want,” Peter's face softens.

Michelle becomes quiet, thinking it over. Then, but hesitating, she marvels at his benevolence.

Finally, she concludes, “No. That’s what they would want.” He doesn’t know who she’s talking about, so she goes, “The old couple; the lady in pointy shoes and bad green eyeshadow who’s with the guy with the awful comb-over.”

Grinning and glancing around briefly, Peter plays around, asks, “Which one?”

Their shared laughter is brief, cut short by a shrill ring of an alert from his cellphone. The drop and blanking of Peter’s face motivates Michelle to ask what the alarm had been for and whether it was important. But Peter only blinks, shoves it back in his pocket, and lies that the police alert, “Isn’t very important.”

And as expected, Michelle isn’t convinced—she isn’t dumb and she certainly isn’t _blind_.

“I’m sure,” he adds. And to further his lie and facade, he inquires about checking out the food table with a hand on her back.

A chill rides down her spine even when she sarcastically spits, “Such behavior. Why don’t you introduce me as your _grandmother_ already?”

“Grandmother? Aren’t we—?” A finger taps the thin material of her dress, careful to avoid the bare skin shown by her dress's open-back.

Michelle squirms, uncomfortable. “Lower your hand, smooth guy,” she hisses and his ears blush loudly.

“_Wait—what?_”

She smiles in passing at an old woman wearing large clip-on pearl earrings and lipstick that's too loud for her skin color and who's rushing for the restroom.

“My _back_, not my _shoulders_. I’m not your _mother_ or something. We’re supposed to be _engaged_, remember?”

The engagement is a cover, a _lie_ about Peter’s title as her plus-one for this party, equipped with matching wedding rings rented specifically for this occasion.

Peter appears to visibly calm at this. “Yeah, right. Right,” he breathes, and does as he’s instructed.

Again, Michelle shivers. He tries to not take notice. (He fails.) Breathing just the slightest uneasily, Michelle juts her chin in the direction of the appetizers to shift the attention

The food fits the occasion, Peter thinks, taking in the long table filled with platters of food: plates of small crackers, variations of cubed cheeses, small cut meats on toothpicks, sparkling alcohol, a half-eaten tray of room temperature sushi, a small fondue fountain at the end of the table.

Peter examines a piece of meat, mentally criticizing its ridiculous, cruelly miniscule cut. If he were to stack it with a cube of cheese on a cracker, it all would barely be a full bite.

Taking notice of his subtle disappointment, Michelle smiles, amused.

Peter’s gaze sweeps across small finger sandwiches on white bread barely half his palm's size, goose pate spread, fruit platters, crunchy vegetables of carrots and broccoli and cucumbers, and what he thinks is _caviar_ is served in a white porcelain dish with a golden spoon.

His face expresses his amazement—a mix of impress and disbelief.

Michelle advices in a whisper, “I wouldn’t try the sushi.”

She stands off to the side, snacking on bits of cubed cheese and raw broccoli, waiting for him to finish inspecting the table of proportionally unimpressive foods. When he returns, there’s a wrinkle between his brows.

“You got your fill?”

Looking down at what he’s managed to fill his small glass plate with, it’s disappointing; it’s sad. “This could barely fill up a baby.”

Michelle laughs around the toothpick in her mouth. “I know, right?”

* * *

They speak with company heads, representatives, entrepreneurs, and sponsors long into the night.

In conversation, Peter boasts about Michelle and her business. While separate, Michelle smiles and works to keep up the representation and clean face of the company she’s inherited.

She talks with business partners, foundation heads; a woman her elder gawks at Michelle's ring before going off on a tangent about her own late husband—he had been a co-founder of a now-corporate chain, Michelle is told. She and the woman talk for a long while, ending with exchanging business cards and setting up a future meeting date.

Peter is leaving the food table for the third time that evening, licking off cheese from his thumb when he’s intersected by a friendly, familiar voice.

“You finally waxed that eyebrow of yours. Now you don’t have a trademark... Disappointing.” It’s from a well-dressed man near Peter’s age, smiling brightly which Peter himself soon mirrors once pinpointing his familiarity.

“You fixed your teeth,” Peter retorts back, playfully. “And...you looked tougher with the busted lip. It was a good distraction from that chip on your tooth,” Peter notices that the other’s suit is expensive, like his own—it’s even _more_ expensive.

The other man raises a hand to his chest as if he’s offended. “_Please_. I’ve _always_ been the tougher between us two.”

“Yeah…” Peter agrees, watching the other shrug smugly with hands in pockets. "Except for that one summer during camp when you _wet yourself_.” It’s about an incident that happened far back during the summer on the cusp of starting fourth grade, an incident that Peter enjoys hanging over his old friend’s head now and then as a light tease. And he earns an eye roll from the other at this. “Didn’t expect to see you here, Harry!”

“Likewise.” This small moment makes the business man appear boyish in compare to the face he wears for work. It doesn’t help that a good percentage of the attendants here are a full generation or two older.

And Peter’s smile grows to be wide and toothy as he’s asked what has brought him here, and catching Michelle approach from the crowding of people to whisper in Peter’s ear, and then having the pleasure of watching Harry’s eyebrows arch upwards in _shock _as Peter grabs Michelle’s hand with one of his and the other snakes around her waist. He ignores the quick glance she shoots him as he begins to introduce them both, together.

“Michelle, this is Harry—”

“Harr—? Wait, you two know—you _know_ Mr. Osborn?”

“Since grade school,” Peter smiles up at her. “Harry, this is _my fiancé_, Michelle.” He makes a show of extending her ring hand in Harry’s direction. The self-satisfied smile of Peter’s doesn’t go away at all. Michelle tries not to squirm at the sudden honned-in attention.

Harry takes a moment to blink and process. Then his lip juts in an upturned U and he nods, impressed. A crystal glass in one hand, he scoffs in impress. “I’m…_shocked_, Pete. Truly. Forgive me, but—_truly_.” Directing to Michelle now, he adds, “You look _stunning_, Mrs. Parker.”

“It’s Watson, actually.” She digs deeper into the lie with a polite smile. “No changing the name.”

Harry nods again in respect. To Peter, he teases, “Lucky she met you first, dude. I've missed my chance.” To Michelle, he compliments how beautiful she looks tonight and then he winks as he adds, “If he ever gives you any trouble, I’ll help knock him back on his ass,” and adds two soft, mock boxing punches in the air.

She smiles in appreciation. “I’ll keep that offer in mind, Mr. Osborn.”

Peter’s smile becoming a frown goes unaddressed but not unseen.

The subject about how the two men are so familiar is asked then. It’s followed by a long self-boastful narration by Harry featuring Peter’s input. Luckily for Michelle, she’s able to gain Harry’s partnership and support by its end.

Harry departs with a kiss to the back of her hand and both exchange business cards. He and Peter exchanging phone numbers and schedules, appearing much like the children they last saw themselves face-to-face as.

* * *

“Well,” Michelle goes, stomach finally fully and happy. “That went a lot _better_ than anticipated. And additionally, _several sponsors_ agreed to provide grants. ...I hope this works…” She picks up her tall cup from the holder between the two front seats and takes long gulps through the cheap straw.

“And this could go well for protection in the long run.” Peter looks over, briefly, seat reclined at an angle.

Michelle nods, mouth full from another bite of her hamburger.

It’s even later that night now. The gala is probably not going to end for another three hours. But with the night sky above them and parked in a space in the lot of a closing fast food restaurant and the interior of Michelle’s car filling with the smells of meat, salt, and barbeque sauce, neither could quite care.

In the passenger seat, Peter shutters at the vivid memory of speaking to a struggling entrepreneur who came from a wealthy family but who had horrendous table manners. Michelle recalls the widow she spoke with, worrying if their scheduled meeting will go over well.

Peter twists his head to the side to reassure as best as he could that it would go over well. Michelle’s calm composure doesn’t stay because there’s a large splotch of mustard on his nose—she offers to rid it for him; Peter’s nose scrunches as she wipes it off with a napkin. He informs that he found out on his own why the sushi isn’t a good selection. Michelle complains that the caviar wasn’t that good either.

She then explains that her strange behavior earlier had been because she had been approached by one of the people she warned him about—the ones who look at her like a sympathy case, like a poor middle class commoner, as someone who doesn’t deserve her position or someone who could never handle it because of her _“background,” _and who she _swears_ has been after her from the start.

There is a heavy pause that passes. Then with the need for noise to rid the silence and needing to lighten the mood, Michelle changes the subject to how delicious this burger tastes after the gala’s finger foods, and that the quiet is nice in comparison to a business duo they met who nearly talked for twelve straight minutes without giving Peter or Michelle a chance to speak.

In the front seat of Michelle’s small car, the two exchange stories; she’s got her knees over the A/C vents on the dashboard, licks off spicy barbecue sauce from the tips of her fingers with a mouthful of burger. She catches him staring.

“What?” She wipes at her face with a clean napkin just in case.

The second burger Peter ordered sits half-eaten in his lap, his bag with fries at his elbow, empty mouth slightly open in a daze.

His stare is different, Michelle thinks—different than the day at the food trucks when he began questioning her motives, and different than their clumsy first meeting; it’s different and it makes her slightly _uneasy_.

Eyes large and doe-like, he starts to speak but his voice croaks, and he backtracks. Clears his throat. “Ms. Watson,” he carries her name so delicately. “You’re one of the most intelligent, respectable, and captivating people in that room.” His heart is in his throat and his hands starting to shake from palpitations caused by his running mouth, from voicing his honest thoughts for the first time.

“You know you don’t have to call me _Watson_ all the time…”

“Yes.” He continues to stare. “You were great back there. Really. You nailed it. And lots of them _liked_ you,” he smiles. “You’ll be fine. You don’t need their snooty money. You don’t need their tacky—”

“Except I kind of _do_ need their money.”

“You know what I mean.” He adjusts so he’s facing her to the best of his ability in the small compartment. “Everything will go great; it will all go according to plan. And if this thing doesn’t work out, then…it must be a bout of really, really bad luck for that short period of time.”

She pauses. “Thanks, I guess.”

Another pause is given as she drinks from her fast food cup. The fact that she doesn’t meet his gaze invites awkward air between the two, and Peter feels like he’s stuck his neck out and she’s sharpening the ax to cut it off.

She finishes her drink, sighs. “Then I guess you’d better not mess this up, Parker.”

The challenging edge to her words make him give the smallest smile. “Surely, ma'am. And if we’re like this now—_married—_”

“You had _way too much fun_ with that.” She lightly laughs.

“Since we’re on first name basis now,” he chuckles, “I’m Peter.”

For some unknown reason, he extends his hand to her—it’s like the same kind of awkward mistake of responding to “Thank you, come again” or an “Enjoy your meal” with a “You too” to a server—and Peter wants to slap himself.

But Michelle is amused at this and shakes his hand at their first informal introduction.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Leave a comment on ao3 if you like this! Reblog on Tumblr to spread the word and love!_   
  
_Send a prompt to my Tumblr if you want to see more chapters (leaving comments is also motivation that will help get more chapters out)_


	8. The one where Peter begins suspecting MJ might have a crush

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Chapter prompt: For the CEO au: Peter gets sick and calls off coming into the office to then get the shit scared out of him bc MJ??? Shows up at his apartment???? With an obscene amount of soup and wearing the scarf he bought her for her birthday**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Chapters and story are driven by prompts sent to my Tumblr writing blog. Those prompts are rearranged to be in timeline order._

It's been over a year now.

Peter has been living in his small city apartment on the lower east side since he broke away from news photography and taken up a full journalism career four weeks before graduating college. The building is decent-looking: the outside is pressure-washed white brick that has randomly broken shutters where the inhabitants were too physical; some paint peels in small corners and determined weeds sprout from the concrete sidewalk; Peter’s apartment is small with a leaky kitchen faucet and a door that sticks too roughly and a squeaky floorboard in the living room. The place isn’t new and has had its fair share of rough tenants but it’s comfy, quiet, and quaint with a mailbox in his name and his neighbor’s cat greets him every morning at eight on the dot and every night before ten. It isn’t a glamorous place—with the screen to his window falling out, the banisters of the apartment stairs stained with marker and pencil graffiti, and there are two shared laundry rooms per floor, and a chain smoker living in the apartment above him who has dropped ashes to Peter’s balcony more than once. It isn’t a _fancy_ place and much of his furniture are hand-me-downs or thrift-store-bought, but he _does_ have a dishwasher and a working Keurig and the best heated water on the floor, and the hook where he hangs his keys (when he remembers to use it) remains sturdy and he has a meticulously acquired collection of takeout menus thrown across the middle of his coffee table. It’s peaceful, pleasant, but—

_But_—

But it’s _private_.

Peter is a very private person, so only a few close, select others know where he lives. An even smaller number whom he has brought upstairs to his residence.

Besides it being a place of his own, his apartment isn’t anything to fawn over—a consequence with his pay grade while living in a city. So, in the past when Ms. Watson asked for his address in order to pick up some paperwork instead of him having to hurry across town because she’s already in an Uber en route anyway, Peter still hauled himself out of bed, threw on semi casual wear of a decent button-down shirt, a suit jacket and pants, and winced catching his reflection in a shop window because he already knew the flicker of displeasure her eyes would show about _suit jackets and denim jeans_, he met her at a location in order to avoid her visit. (She had criticized his attire too, but it didn’t slow her from quickly taking the manila folders, thanking him, and ordering her driver to speed off again, rolling up the window.)

Peter doesn’t tell every single person where his residence is located because, for one: not everyone _needs_ to _know_ where a veteran superhero’s home is. (He and Ned used to joke that it’s his _headquarters_.) And two: because his location has never been of much _importance_.

Which is why when he calls in to work—for both of his jobs—he doesn’t think much of it; Peter reports that he won’t be gathering any information for the next foreseeable days to his journalist boss, and he calls in that he won’t be coming in to the office with Ms. Watson. His journalist boss accepts it quickly, parting with an expected “Get well quickly, Parker.” With Ms. Watson, however, she pauses for a beat and Peter thinks she’s multitasking while on the phone until she shares that she’s noticed he’d been growing sluggish and heard the constant harsh clearing of his throat, his watery eyes, and that he’d been sniffling a lot in the last three days .

Peter’s surprised that she noticed those because even _he_ hadn’t realized it himself, having brushed off each sign until two days ago when he awoke with pain in his throat, a congested nose, and aches all over his body.

“Of course I would notice,” she’d spoken days ago, the phone between her ear and shoulder as she types on her computer, heeled shoes kicked off beneath her desk. “Why wouldn’t I? You looked miserable. I was wondering when you would call out.”

Over the phone line, Peter sucks his teeth.

“And it’s a good thing too. You would have brought a virus into this beehive and that would have been _disastrous_ with us being at our most busiest right now.”

“Glad to know you care _so much_ about your employee’s well-being.” He does his best to sound normal over the line, his nose completely blocked.

“Of course. No problem. That’s what I’m here for.”

He can’t tell if she’s sarcastic or serious. Peter decides to not ask on it and ends the conversation.

* * *

He doesn’t think much about continuing the privacy of his home until his third sick day. It wasn’t something he’s had to actively think about for years now.

Living alone, he’s shuffled to and fro from his small kitchen to warm up heat packs in the microwave, cooking cans of soup on the stove, to swallow down another dose of the medicine in the fridge and then return to bundling up in his bed’s blankets. Two boxes of tissues sit on his little bedside table along with a half-empty glass of orange juice and a bottle of chewable vitamins; a nearly full wire wastebasket sits besides his bedside table. Outside, autumn winds rattle his window. Peter sneezes, curls tighter in his blankets. The television plays on the lowest volume setting. Vehicles rush past outside; one honks loudly and there’s the screeching of tiers, a driver hollering with road rage. Colored, dying leaves get stuck against his window’s glass. Peter sneezes—he indeed feels miserable—and reaches out a hand to open the folder resting atop his blankets with the stack of paperwork; thumbs through the typed reports, photocopied letters, and profile pictures of men and women who may have close relationships to whoever is at the center of Cedill Enterprise’s scandal. He tries to think about it—about the suspects he’s gotten to know, about those he’s yet to talk to, about names he’s heard in passing—but his head throbs terribly and he closes his eyes, drifting off to sleep again before he knows.

* * *

Peter’s awoken by a knock some four hours later. He blinks, a bit disoriented, and the knock repeats just as rushed as the first. He croaks, “Coming!” and detangles from his three blankets, adjusts his pullover sweater, corrected his crooked socks. Shuffles to the front door and peeks through the peephole. The woman, whoever it is, has her back to the door.

He calls, “Who is it?” and he jumps, eyes bulging, when he immediately detects his boss’ voice answering “Watson,” followed by a muttered complaint about the cold temperature.

Peter turns into a dazed frenzy in both mentally and his motions.

“Oh—okay. Give me a minute!” he calls while hurrying the best he can with a headache: throwing away tissues and tossing clothes into his hamper, kicks his shoes into his closet, loses the slipper he’s wearing and pulls it from within the small pile. He tries to quietly set his dirty dishes in a single side of the sink instead of spread throughout both; cleans off a spot of spilled soup on the counter; uses a new sheet of paper towel to blow his nose into, instantly regrets using the rougher material, and runs his hands through the faucet water. Hurriedly switching out his pajamas for a pair of jeans. Answers the door still in house slippers; Michelle rushes inside, making her way to his small dining table to the right, rubbing her hands together and hissing from the cold.

Peter sniffs. “Um. Welcome.”

“Only took you forever and a day to open the door.” She blows hot breaths into her hands.

“It’s not even that cold,” he mutters and then shakes his head. “More even—what are—how did you _find_ where I live?” His voice rasps and is sickly.

She stares at him for a beat and he thinks she hasn’t understood what he’s said. But she has, and answers in an _obvious_ tone: “Your address is on your resume.”

Peter curses in a low breath. “Ma'am—I don’t mean to be rude—but what are you doing here?”

Michelle takes her time to respond, slowly taking in the view of his apartment. “Small,” she comments, and he’s standing off to the side in the doorway of the kitchen, nervously fidgeting with his hands and watching her, trying to gauge her reactions, to read her thoughts about his inelegant home. As she slips past him into the living room, she glances to the closed door of his bedroom, to the mostly bare walls and the signed magazine framed on the walls and his few familial photos, catches his hunched shoulders and cautious demeanor, and she chuckles, “Nice.” Sees the straightened stack of takeout menus, the three framed photographs hung beside the the living room television, the faint ring from coffee forgotten on the kitchen counter. “Homey.”

Peter sniffs. Begins again: “Ms. Watson…”

“Hm?” Her eyes go wide and she blinks at him, innocent-like.

“You came over here for…?” He leads. “Now isn’t a really good time to—”

“Ah yes!” She snaps her fingers and hands over the binder held against her chest. “I came over for your assistance,” she begins, shoving it in his hands. It’s hardcover and black, stuffed full with papers. He doesn’t know what it’s for. “This is your snooper’s notebook, isn’t it? Found it in your desk.”

Taking a closer look at it, he realizes that it _is_ his. “How did you get—?”

“That isn’t important.” She waves her hand dismissively. She steps closer, and by coincidental timing, Peter inhales as she’s beside him, inhales the scented oil she rubs over her neck, of the eucalyptus from the hand sanitizer lingering on her hands, of the remnants of a coffee shop clinging to her clothes from when she stood inside just before entering his apartment building. She’s pressed close to him and he stops, stares, and swallows uncertainly. “Here.” She reaches around his arm to flip through his notes until coming to a signature at the bottom of a photocopied signed consent form. “This man. I know him. And this woman; I know of her too. They were at that sponsor dinner and then at the opening to that new firm. I believe they’re working together.”

“Why do you _think they’re important?_ Are they suspicious?”

“Besides morally? And that they never attend or host charity events, for one? Because this guy,” she points back at the scrawl of chicken scratch with one hand, is thumbing through her cell phone with the other. “He came to my office a month or two before you came. His wife had just filed for divorce against him.”

Peter still doesn’t understand why this is important.

Michelle puts emphasis when she shares: “He _really_ likes his money. It’s rumored that he has offshore accounts, too. And his wife was settling for a _pretty heavy_ settlement: _at least_ half of what they own.”

“Alright. …But what makes you think it could be him specifically?”

“Because he’s a rich Republican. That should say enough.”

He gives a short chuckle. “Ms. Watson, I can’t use that. I need more _solid_—”

“I know that. Duh. I’ve interacted with this guy before though, and he’s definitely _bad news_.”

“Is that all?” Is all it is is suspicions?

She pauses, recalling memories. “He once tried to get me to join in a scheme he and a few others were planning. Told me at a party a year ago, maybe. …He doesn’t like being told '_no thanks’_.”

Peter frowns. “Why didn’t you tell me this before?”

Her answer is a bold, silent stare. If there was a verbal response, he knows what it would be already, and it has to do with their status being newly met strangers, of their strictly-business relationship unlike his potential web of budding emotions being secretly harbored.

Peter turns back to the report in his hands and which Michelle has now re-read many times over.

“I have his contact,” Michelle adds. “He’s going to be in New York at a conference in two months, but anything else I can’t give you. Especially not right now.”

Peter nods, pursing his lips.

The back of her hand brushed across his and goosebumps explode up his arms; there’s a _shiver_ that passes through her but she shrugs it off and tosses her hair to hide the reaction. Michelle inhales whatever_ that_ was; exhales confidence, dominance. She asks, “so what do you want to do about it?”

He thinks it over for a moment. “What’s he’s going to New York for?”

“Like I said: anything else I can’t tell you right now.”

Deciding to not press further in fear she retracts, Peter only nods. There is a silence that passes between them that comes with the wind rattling the windows, a meow heard next door, the chiming of a bike’s bell outside, and loud thundering from the attendant upstairs.

“Um... So...” Michelle clears her throat. “This woman here: you might be able to get to her much easier, going by your connections.” Catching Peter’s raised brows in confusion, her gaze catches his and holds. “She’s recently partnered with Oscorp, and she was a close friend to the recently divorced wife of _him_.” She means the man with the chicken scratch handwriting. “If there’s anyone who can give you a door into this whole thing, it’s her.”

“Have you spoken to her already? Or anytime recently?”

“I _would_…but she isn’t exactly _friendly_ with those who are _my type_.” She examines her fingernails, her hands empty of any jewelry.

Peter sniffs from a congested nose, coughing in his elbow from a tickle in his throat, and sighs. “Alright then.”

And Michelle runs fingers through her hair, scrolls through her phone.

“What else is it that you wanted to show me?”

“Show you?”

“Did you…come all this way to show me…this?”

She’s confused for a moment...then it hits her. “Oh! No. I—I… I came with a proposal: for you to accommodate me on the next business trip when I have to cross paths with these two.” She upholds her demeanor despite it slipping for that moment; nods to the binder still opened in his hands.

He blinks once, twice, unexpecting such an opportunity. “Yes, yes. Thank you.”

Michelle bites the inside of her cheek to hold in a grin. “Also, I… I…” She huffs, gives a shiver as the heat turns back on, blowing directly on her from the air vent, and if Peter didn’t know any better he would think that she’s _blushing_. Pulling a container from the handbag on her elbow, Michelle frowns as she tells, “this is for you.”

Nose and cheekbones a tinge red and still unprepared, Peter clears his throat before giving a shy 'thanks’. “But, uh, what is this for—”

“Jesus, Parker. So many questions!” And her frown deepens; places a protective hand on her bag’s strap. Rolls her eyes. “You’re, like, you’re my hardest working employee so I can’t have you out for too long, obviously.” Michelle can’t look him in the eye and Peter takes notice of this, squinting just the slightest at her sudden restlessness. “Can’t have you slacking off, of course. Obviously. It’s—again, like I said, it’s our _busiest season_ so I need you back in the office A.S.A.P.”

“Okay, uh…. Okay. Thanks…?”

“You’re welcome,” she responds _too_ quickly. Is suddenly very interested in her fingernails.

“Ms. Watson….?”

Another beat of silence passes again; and there’s a loud rattling of dumpster trash cans outside, the ashes of Peter’s upstairs neighbor emptying their cigarette tray falling to his small balcony, another apartment door somewhere inside slams open and close two times.

“Hey?”

She hums in acknowledgement but still doesn’t looking towards him, and shuffles inside her large name-brand purse.

“You’re wearing the scarf.”

“Hm?” There’s the smallest hint of a smile on his face and she _hates it_, she _hates it, she hates it so much_. “Yeah. It’s—it’s…nice. It’s warm.” Speedily, she adds, “and it’s cold outside, so, yeah, of course I’d wear it.”

His _annoying grin_ widens to a small smile. “It looks nice.”

“It’s just a scarf—”

“Yeah but it’s nice on you.” He catches her gaze when it flickers to him. “And you were going to return it,” Peter teases.

“Yeah, yeah. I guess you actually have good taste in _some things_.”

He smiles fully now, albeit shyly. “I’ll take that.”

“Mmhm, Parker.” Her bashfulness melts away and she thumps him playfully on the arm. “Don’t get ahead of yourself _just yet_.” A flash of a grin is given, a quick slip of her lips from between her teeth. “And _these_—you’re going to have to take too. Because _God _you sound _terrible_.” Making a beeline around him, Michelle drops two large thermoses on his old, small kitchen counter.

A brow raises in question. Michelle answers with a small shrug. “Soup. Like, what else do you eat when you’re sick?”

Peter opens his mouth to respond, backtracks, and refrains. Instead, he sniffs again, forced to breath through his mouth. “Okay. Thanks. And, just checking…is there anything else important you came here to tell me about?”

“Yes.” Michelle steps toward him. “I expect you to eat all of this and be bright and ready when you return. When you feel better, I mean.” A hand slaps her narrow hip. “It’s quite difficult being there without my assistant.”

She can see the faint blush creeping up his throat from overheating, the fading bags under his eyes, the evidence of growing wrinkles on his forehead and at the corners of his mouth. And then his eyes are widening in that—what, that fucking _doe-eyed_ look.

In the short months Peter has been employed under Ms. Michelle Watson, he’s learned that she’s a very straightforward woman at all times except when it _counts_, which is when he’s left to try and decipher her like a math problem; when he’s left to read between the lines; as he’s left wide-eyed and dazzled when realizing out what she means, when he _thinks_ he knows what she means. Because she’s spoken like this once before: months ago when she opened up over dinner and wine while he had been held up in her apartment by a heavy thunderstorm.

Peter blinks.

Michelle smiles.

He remembers the clenching in his chest and butterflies in his stomach he felt back when they shared wine and stories and wonders if today, if since then, _if now_ does she…like him? _Could_ she also feel…

A small part of him questions and wants to ask her…

He sniffs, then starts: “Um, ma'am. …Do you…do you have a….?”

She responses with “Do I what?” too calmly and it kills his curiosity.

The soup inside the container he’s holding is beginning to burn his palms. His throat is scratching and he’s going to need another face tissue soon.

“Uh—uh, um, nothing. It’s nothing. Never mind.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _Leave a comment on ao3 if you like this! Reblog on Tumblr to spread the word and love!_   
  
_Send a prompt to my Tumblr if you want to see more chapters (leaving comments is also motivation that will help get more chapters out)_


	9. The one where MJ and Peter make their first mistake: acting on harbored feelings

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Chapter prompt: idk if u take requests but can u write about spideychelle's first kiss for the CEO AU? i love it so much, it's one of my favs!**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a chapter where, when arranged in time order, would come next. However due to no prompts sent to cover the time between, we are jumping into the beginning of escalating risks and their first mistake: acting on their feelings.
> 
> If I receive prompts set before this, and therefore before their "mistake" (or any prompts, really) I can rearrange the chapters so when you go back and read them, it is still in chronological order.

Deep down, Michelle J. Watson knew she would be tied to Mr. Parker ever since their first run-in to each other—whether it be by job history association, whether he would somehow end up caught in the scandals of her job's current plummet, whether he'd just be another one she would end up running off. She didn't expect him to last long. She wouldn't hold it against him if he didn't. None of them ever do...

Whether or not their ties would end up being semi-strong or not, the act of crossing the strictly employer/employee line of professionalism into easing into personal territory wasn’t intentional; it never was, _ever_, and it just sort of..._happened_.

Ms. Michelle Watson knew she would be tied to Mr. Parker ever since she began holding his _secrets, _before he even suspected it. And back at the corporate building she inherited—where she had been marked as a take-down, as a suspect in her own case—he'd already known the same, and she had been determined not to let him know that _she_ knew. Because Mr. Parker is terrible at being subtle, at keeping things hidden. (He’d proven this himself and Michelle doesn’t think she’s going to let him forget it anytime soon.) But if she'd say she isn't impressed by his determination and persistence, she would be lying.

Unfortunately, Michelle is just as used to lying through her teeth as she's at presenting a professional poker face.

Months prior, Mr. Parker put his personality traits to the test when he lost three rounds and a weekend off after that when he mistakenly, foolishly asked Ms. Watson out for drinks. But it had all been a _cover,_ he assures himself, and that the outing had been the start of reparations, but he’s tapped out forty minutes into the middle of his second drink of hard liquor, so Michelle's pretty sure _she’s_ won.

When Michelle J. Watson assumed she would be tied to Mr. Parker, she thought _professionally_, she thought it had an _expiration date_. What she got was a big fucking slap in the face from _whatever_ it may be—destiny, fate, coincidental timing—which makes her crinkle her nose and roll her eyes at the whole absurdity of the suggestion, that she even _thought_ of it as a cause of it.

Life doesn’t always fall into place the way it’s planned.

Because one random week, Michelle decides to amuse herself with the antics of Mr. Parker by having him run around for her bidding—like watching a mouse, like all the glories that came with having a personal assistant until the time she decides to fire him to save herself the disappointment. But sometime after she’s gotten comfortable and he’s gotten in the groove of everything…things _changed_.

And now it’s fourteen more months later and rain water splashes from the concrete onto her ankles and the green, red, white flickering lights reflect in her earrings and in her eyes and cause a positively hypnotic sight even though she's frowning; because of tension, the lights are more blaring then they are festive. Her hair is frizzing from the humidity. She’s rummages through her clutch for her key to bypass the front door. Rust stains the hinges of the outer front door of the multi condo luxury building.

Outside, pedestrians scurry past beneath umbrellas and ponchos and Michelle tries to shield herself from the freezing wind and rain. There’s an expensive ring around her finger—it serves as a hoax, a lie for her to worm her way further up the social latter. Lately, she's begun regretting it by a small amount.

Peter’s foot is in her door’s way preventing it from closing.

His breaths are coming fast, punched out of his lungs by adrenaline and exhilaration. The air is crisp, sharp against his throat and emotions sharp and tingling nerves inside his stomach.

“Don’t—” he starts, hand still flat against the slick black door.

The front desk is through a set of glass doors and he tries not to be too loud incase they hear and would approach.

Peter curls his hand in a fist, closes his eyes and starts again. “Don’t…” Licks his lips. Gaze darts to her, down to his feet, then back up again. “This isn’t something that can just be _brushed off_.”

“Sure it can,” she speaks, stern as ever; she speaks this like she’s sure about the matter, about everything else in the world and carried with the same confidence as she always has. “We’ll just say that nothing happened, just like everything else. _Right_, Parker?”

There’s a dent in the bottom of the door kicked in by his foot weeks ago and on accident.

Seconds are passing like minutes. The large decorative clock in the small lobby ticks away every anxiety-ridden second.

“I—Ms. Watson—_no!_”

She scoffs, blinking incredulously, and crosses her arms. “Excuse me?”

“No.” This time it wavers in his throat and he gulps. “No—ma'am, I—I just can’t.”

“That wasn’t a question.”

He’s deflating. “I know, I know. It’s just—”

“Just _what?_” comes out impatiently.

Peter's window of opportunity is closing.

Like he’s finally letting loose secret, he feels better saying out loud: “I _like_ you, Ms. Watson.” She looks alarmed at his words but Peter continues on. “And I know you feel the sa—_something._ Back at the fundraiser—was that…was that _all fake?_ Even the way you were there too? Because it didn’t seem like it to me—_you_ didn’t seem like it to me.” As he speaks, he grows more confident, his posture taking effect.

“_Watson_ is too formal for this,” she mumbles, intended for herself.

“_Michelle_ then.”

Her chin jerks forward but he can’t quite read her facial expression—but it wasn’t anger despite the glare, he’s glad.

Not quite sure how she feels about him speaking her name (but it does send small jolts to her stomach), she averts her eyes, arms still crossed and there is a hard slant to her jaw. “What happened back there…wasn’t…it wasn’t planned, so—”

He assures that very little of what happened that night was planned.

“It wasn’t planned, so it’s…_I_ wasn’t truly myself so it isn’t concrete enough to go by.”

“It went against protocol so it doesn’t count. Yeah, yeah.” He nods, finishing the sentence for her. That his words are laced with something—bitterness, offense—isn’t ignored and her eyes squint in response. “Well I call bullshit,” he shrugs.

“Well what you think—”

“How long have we been working together? Almost two years now?” He flies right over her weakening attempt to control the conversation. “So, for almost two years I’ve been working close by you, doing everything for you, listening to you, learning about you…and you don’t think there would be _some thing_…? And you can’t say I wouldn’t pick up on something, Ms—Michelle.”

She pokes her tongue in her cheek, sways her crosses arms as she thinks, glancing at raindrops splash into a puddle on the sidewalk behind him. At the cars and motorcycles driving past in the lightening drizzle, throwing up sprays of street water. She focuses on the point right above Peter’s ear, at the bit of hair pressing flat onto his head caused from getting wet to keep her dry mere minutes ago, and of the grey-blue overcast sky that’s darkening. She focuses on the changing color of a faraway crosswalk, a blinking of white, orange _WALK_, and red that’s overly saturated as her awareness and nerves are dialed up to _high_.

“What you think you—”

“What I _know._ And part of it is _reading you_. All I’m asking for is a confirmation. A yes or a no… A something.”

He’s strung himself out on a string here already so the least she could do is cut his cord with the dignity of a rejection.

The sight of the two on the front step and in the doorway of a luxury apartment building is an amusing contrast of Peter’s slacked shoulders and stance, wistfully asking for the thing he’s been suspicious of for months, and Michelle’s hard, defensive slant of her hips but without the authority in her voice. Her dress sticks to her frame due to humidity and slight perspiration. His shoulders are spotted with rainwater.

After what feels like several more excruciating minutes, when she finally asks for his efforts “Do you want a medal?” the atmosphere noticeably becomes cooler than the autumn air.

And then it’s hot—his emotions are hot and warm orange turning red and _oh no—_because Peter journeys through a range of shock, offended, sad and hurt before a more vocal emotion starts bubbling to the surface as he mentally prepares his words. But it doesn’t make its way out because Michelle then asks, tone softening in defeat: “Whatever you decide just leave that out of your report, your story, will you?” Then as if as a second thought, adds, “Please?”

Peter’s frustration flies out the window along the wet breeze that blows.

“I’m sure you already know the policy about employee relationships and this...this would be the most messed up of them all.” A dry laugh is given. She rubs her lips together in the fashion women wearing lipstick usually do when biding time. “So...” she sighs, takes a step back inside and begins closing the door. “Like I said: it will be like nothing ever happened.” The smile given doesn’t reach her eyes.

At that moment an elderly couple excuse themselves to exit the building and Michelle and Peter step aside in pardon. As Michelle is closing it back with downcast eyes, Peter’s foot catches it again.

“Michelle,” comes as a low plea, a whisper as he then takes her hand with an equally concerned look to his eyes.

There isn’t an objection given—not verbally, but the look she wears speaks as much so.

Peter grimaces. A handkerchief of emerald green silk is tucked into his suit’s front pocket. His trousers are drenched an inch up the pant’s end. “I understand why this—why you feel this way. And with all of what happened, I understand on any possible slim chances and given the time and attention…because it has to be kept a big secret. I understand, I do. But—”

“I like you, Peter. I…I do. And yes, _maybe_ a little more than _in that way _too, but I…” She sighs, rubbing her arms from the cold and her sudden self-consciousness. She’s closed the door behind her, now back to standing outside with him beneath the small overhanging above the building doorstep.

He's never seen her this way and it partially unnerves him. “But…?” he urges on, his heart on a thin string.

She hesitates. “But I can’t do anything…anything with you.” She takes a moment. “Anything at all. …At least anything _first_.”

He thinks for a long moment, her words processing. Peter understands, he truly does, but he thinks, _hopes_ there’s a way to pursue this. And not fully finished rolling over the possibilities and foreseeable outcomes in his mind, he speaks before thinking: “Can I kiss you?”

Black mascara has started to clump on her eyelashes. The twinkling reflection in her necklace is of the passing vehicle lights and quickening rise and fall of her chest. “Well I’m not giving in to kiss you first.”

And he scrubs at his wrists with understandable anxiety, not like it _matters_—because there’s still going to be perspiration on his finger pads and palms and his hairs are standing on end as slowly, excruciatingly, he leaves a well-mannered kiss on her left cheek. This time, it isn’t quick and polite like needed during the events she’s invited to in order to hold up the front as a couple. This time it’s slow and unsure and meaningful.

Her breath blows against the side of his face in a sigh and the petal-soft brush of her eyelashes raises goosebumps from exhilaration, her face tilting for measure. It’s their first kiss and it couldn’t be more modest in front of an empty sidewalk in the rain on her building's doorstep.

In the midst of him slowly backing away and her turning to face forward, their lips brush in the faintest fashion. Michelle licks hers, the evening air a mixture of chilly and heat from raised heartbeats. Neither bother to respond to the close encounter and the the pinging wail of a police siren echoes around them, speeding down the road. She notices her hands on his suit’s jacket and the dinner mint tingling in her molars and on the roof of her mouth, and the humidity sticking her hair to the nape of her neck and the faint pink blooming blush of his pale cheeks journeying from his ears.

Michelle hums, unnecessarily. Clenches and unclenches her jaw. Rolls the pads of her fingers against the warm polyester of his suit’s collar.

“What?” Peter asks, squinting, studying, watching and waiting, his stare heavy with expectation and meaning and _hope_.

Abruptly, Michelle tightens her grip on the folds of the collar of Peter’s jacket and there’s a jerk, the smallest _pull_ as her back falls on the smooth, heavy wooden door.

Michelle’s lips are soft and moist and oddly, tentatively palatable.

She wasn’t supposed to _kiss back_, this she knows and planned prior. Likewise, Peter wasn’t supposed to press closer. He wasn’t supposed to fist his hands in the sides of her dress, tilt his head to the side, then hold her steady along the dip in her back. And she wasn’t supposed to arch her spine or open her mouth or catch her breath and fucking _tremble_ from thinking how it’s been long, so long… She was supposed to nod her head, depart, and have all this be over. She was supposed to lie to herself again because that helped and it kept everyone save, everything secure.

Instead she inhales, wedges a knee into the gap between Peter’s legs. And it’s frantic: the liquid roll of her hips and the telltale jerk of her arms readying to pull away but stopping short...but the slide of his tongue is so, so slow, so slick and inviting, and he kisses her like he’s patient, like he’s biding his time, like his heart isn’t thumping for escape against his ribs, against _Michelle’s_ ribs, like there isn’t a sound—low-pitched and helplessly guttural—being drawn out from deep within his throat.

He kisses like it’s _easy_, like Michelle is a procured remedy...like he isn't expecting to feel scarily off-balance when she forcefully stops it all and they drink in air.

Michelle forces it to end with a downward tilt of her chin and a gentle nudging _push_ away by his shoulders and a _realization_. Her hair is a mess at the bangs, condensation wets her back from leaning her weight against the door, and she looks _regretful_.

Then Michelle's frantic, covers her mouth, apologizing in gasps, and then she’s gone, fleeing behind the door of her building.

Peter is left standing on the building’s raised doorstep.


	10. The one where they begin deciding what takes priority

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Chapter prompt: Peter and MJ have a serious conversation of what comes first and takes priority for them. Does Spider-Man take priority over their relationship? Does being a CEO take priority over being with Peter?**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi all! How is everyone's new year going? Well I hope! In celebration of the recent holidays and the new year, I have dropped THREE (3) installments to this CEO AU
> 
> Two of them are nsfw/smut chapters that can be found on my Tumblr. They are a part of a verse separate from this main one, in that verse where MJ and Peter become VERY EXPLICIT lovers whose relationship becomes even more a secret. I hope you take a look at them!
> 
> The third installment is this chapter here. You can also read those mentioned nsfw chapters as a sort of time-filler, that if the couple were to be having an explicit relationship, this ao3 chapter here would take place some time after the second nsfw installment

Michelle incorporates a lot of "isn't’s" and "don't’s" into who she is: like, she _isn’t _one who dawdles and she _isn’t _ever late; she _isn’t _one who refuses to contribute or turn a blind eye; that she _isn’t _good at taking compliments and she _isn’t _a boss to take out for drinks because she's insist “it’s unprofessional. And, besides, I’m going to miss Scandal for one night to risk showing my shit-face? I think not.”

To please Michelle J. Watson, _don’t _fetch her caffeinated coffee but make it decaf if it must be done. Also, _don’t _set the assigned folders in anything but the meticulously designed organization that’s been used since before she inherited her CEO position. And _don’t _be late, _don’t _slack, _don’t _contact her on her days off unless it is an absolute emergency like if the building is up in flames. _Don’t _touch the things around her office or on her desk, and _don’t _try to belittle or discredit or disrespect—

Sometimes she’s just…a lot.

And then when Peter Parker comes into the picture, she turns into a lot of _can't’s_: like, how he _can’t _talk to her about anything other than their jobs and the information that is classified as confidential by her. That they _can’t _be more than a few offices away at times because that’s his job and she’s busy and a professional who needs assistance and at every hour and a half she needs a refill on her herbal tea. How they _can’t _let it be known that he slipped out that little detail about him being an investigative reporter to find the rat in the company. And then it becomes how she _can’t _meet him for a drink after-hours, not one, ever. And then she _can’t _let emotions get in the way of productivity no matter what, and how they _can’t _be anything but professional together or let feelings get the better of them. And then how she _can’t _let him kiss her, be with her, lay with her, again and again and again and again and again—

Michelle says a lot of things about what she shouldn’t do.

What surprises Peter is when she speaks how they “most definitely cannot be seen together,” she means it.

That rule isn’t followed as she breaks her own rule of never intermixing personal and business—at least not on this level.

To appear as separate people became natural, though it didn’t feel _right_. It felt deceitful, dirty. And sometimes Peter would think about it all—about this tangled web he’s unintentionally become involved in. Yet he can't complain because it all occurred out of a sort of a necessity, no matter how much he doesn't like it. And sometimes, he feels as if Michelle feels the same way...But he's also afraid to ask, and thus he's left guessing and deciphering her actions and moods.

* * *

In August, Michelle springs the news that Peter is needed at her side while attending a fifteen-day business trip out of town. The plane leaves at eight A.M., he’s told six days in advance. He doesn’t have the room to complain. He does go home and vent about it to the neighbor’s cat who always seems to be waiting for him.

This business trip marks the third week of their mutually-inflicted bare minimum of contact that had followed a lonely weekend in which Michelle had been swamped with paperwork and Peter swinging around the city in costume, forgetful. The two were supposed to meet up to discuss work information, and—she secretly planned—to pop the question regarding the status of their unofficial and non-professional relationship because she’s been growing suspicious of his increasingly extensive out-of-work random runs. But she can't exactly _say _that it bothers her much because they never even established a status or title. Nothing has been made official, not verbally.

So, she has nothing to be bothered about, right?—she believes, she _lies_—until she catches the name _Cat _on his phone’s screen from over his shoulder. Michelle shrugs it off at first but it continues on, not being a one-time occurrence. She catches _Cat _flash in white lettering on his screen while passing him in the hallways or past his desk. She reads _Cat _as the receiver’s name in his text conversations in-between business meetings (_real _meetings, not the lust-filled codeword). And she has seen him checking attachments messaged from _Cat _when at Michelle’s residence, or waking up in the middle of the night when Peter’s phone’s light is illuminating her dark bedroom and he’s sitting shirtless at the end of her bed because he has to answer a notification from _Cat_.

It doesn't _bother _Michelle, no, because she and Peter are both functioning adults capable of making mature decisions and neither are in a committed, established relationship with each other, or anyone else for that matter, so it’s truly none of her business. And _so what _if her imagine jumps and creates scenarios or speculations. _So what _if she’s sitting at the expansive dark-painted hardwood desk of her deluxe suite hotel room and biting her thumbnail, thinking in exaggerations and ruining her manicure. So what. This isn’t a _problem._ She isn’t _troubled_.

Paperwork forgotten, Michelle’s toes curl atop the carpet. She tugs the complementary white robe around her frame, looks to television playing a re-run of Real Housewives of Atlanta on mute. Outside, the night sky is decorated by the abundance of city and vehicle headlights. She sees her reflection stare back through the wide windows, the blinds drawn open. If she strains her ears, she can hear music playing from an open window some floors above.

Earlier that day Michelle attended a very important corporate meeting with several other rich business partners, and she had been _embarrassed_ that Peter made her look like a _fool_, him hurrying in late, still buttoning his suit jacket in haste, an iPad and notepad in the crook of an elbow and him _reeking _of smoke—not the cigarette kind but the dark, plumage kind that chars and burns. He was supposed to be there as a witness in case anything happens and to take recordings of her meeting—and he slides in the room nearly twelve minutes late.

Michelle hasn’t seen him since that meeting ended hours ago. She knows that he's using this business trip as an opportunity to snoop around for information regarding his investigation but she also planned for them to meet up at a seafood restaurant because… Well it doesn’t quite matter _now_, does it? she thinks.

The rented wedding ring—her copy which she doesn’t leave the hotel room without; its become a habit like wearing a pair of earrings—sits in a black velvet box among her jewelry. But for the past three weeks, it hasn’t been worn since she and Peter silently, mutually agreed to keep their distance after a tired and stressed-fueled dispute. It was agreed to keep the rings _off _because they were to be returned two days after they returned from this business trip anyway and this fake relationship isn't needed to continue outside of invited events, they assume—not until Michelle can find the right time to announce their separation to save face. But behind Peter’s sudden increasing absence, Michelle can’t help but think… Which also the other part of Michelle’s worry: is because she hasn’t been able to find Peter’s ring anywhere.

Michelle slowly pads across her large hotel room. She’s barefoot and recently showered in hopes it would help her rising anxiety about everything. Her cellphone tosses between her palms. She pulls her robe tight around her shoulders again, shivers at the air’s temperature, at her nerves. Feels her bra strap digging in her shoulder. Enters and exits Peter’s contact in her text messages. Turns the screen off, watches television until the commercials play. Opens the text app again. Thinks about room service, about the meeting today and the one scheduled for tomorrow. Thinks about she and Peter’s talk on the plane regarding work and the attendees of these meetings. Thinks about the business corporates who like to talk about liquidation too much and not enough about improvements. She types into a bubble, “Where are you?” Deletes it.

A commercial about a theme park comes on followed by a TV film trailer. Michelle re-types, “Where are you?” followed by “Are you ok” and sends it. Feeling like she needs to cover her intentions, she adds: “It’s been over three hours you are late.” She changes the television channel, skips past a music awards, a cartoon, a documentary, stays on the news. Michelle watches the weatherman gesture around a simulation illustrating clouds and wind patterns and humidity. The view changes to show a man and woman dressed formerly and their focused stares as they read the teleprompter just off camera. Michelle thinks about how the reporters mimic some of the other corporates she has spoken to, their stares remind her. Michelle tosses her phone between her hands.

Twenty minutes pass.

After thirty minutes, she becomes antsy.

Forty-five minutes and three long commercials later there’s still no reply.

A news story about a car pileup comes on screen. Then, one about a house fire. Then, one about a shootout.

Michelle grips her phone tighter; the next reported story is about a robbery. An intrusion saving a domestic abuse victim. Of un-expecting sightings of a superhero seen hours ago: “And surprisingly, the red-suited _Spider-Man _was caught on camera earlier today right when a car bomb was about to detonate,” the reporter speaks. “Whether it is the previous Spider-Man or the current hero is yet to be determined.”

Michelle notices that the footage shown is blocks away from the location where a previous meeting attendee of hers is rooming. She remembers Peter’s rightful suspicion about the old rich man in that hotel, and it’s developed completely from rumors and dropped lawsuits.

The reporter also tells that Spider-Man had been spotted on an outside balcony of a casino, the amateur footage capturing what looked like an interrogation between the hero and a man in a suit, but _who _exactly was being interrogated was difficult to distinguish because of both possessing aggressive stances, the nighttime shadows, and bad pixel quality from the submitted footage.

Michelle thinks about Cat. Michelle thinks about how Peter had held her hand in comfort and secret while in an elevator together. Thinks about his lips on hers. About how he doesn’t normally go ghost like this. And she thinks about all the deaths on the news shown within this city, and she thinks about how Peter still hasn’t responded to her missed calls that are now six hours old. She thinks about the mean men she will have to prove herself to again tomorrow. And she thinks how it’s odd that, on the television, seeing another figure leap from the night shadows and pins the business man again the brick wall, Spider-Man doing nothing to stop it all.

“Another unnamed masked vigilante can be seen interrupting the conversation, seemingly unexpected to the man. Sources haven’t confirmed but it looks like the third person is Black Cat, the thief from New York who has slowly been growing to fame, even earning her own fanbase.” The footage ends, the camera cuts back to the news desk. The woman continues: “Who knows; is she and Spider-Man working together now? And since when?”

“Are they an _item?”_ the man seated beside her adds, jokingly.

As if on cue, Michelle’s phone chirps at an incoming message: it’s from Peter. “Finally,” she breathes.

“Was busy,” he’s sent. Michelle stares at her phone almost in disbelief. Immediately following is a second message: “I got tangled up in something. With work.” She thinks about responding; she thinks about _what _to respond.

“Do you need me to pick you up something on my way back?” he sends next.

And Michelle stares. And thinks. And _contemplates_. When it’s been long enough, she sends a quick, simple, “No.” Thumps her phone against an open palm, debating whether to add something else to follow, wonders _what _to send.

Lately, communication has become short and simple responses that always leave her feeling like she hasn’t said enough or gotten her point across.

She thinks that’s the end of his absence until it happens again. And then three more times after when Peter was supposed to follow her after the meeting to give her the notes he'd taken and the business cards received. So, his absence isn’t so much an inconvenience as it’s a _bother_—because he is supposed to be there for _her _and he only stays until the very end of meetings where one minute he’s walking behind her and eavesdropping on the others in their little group, and then the next minute he’s disappeared.

It all is truly an annoyance than anything for Michelle—so much so that it leads to her suggesting to write the meeting notes herself, which she drops when he questions her about why she feels the need to, and then it leads to passive aggressive greetings when he arrives during the hotel’s complimentary breakfast only to make plate to-go, and Peter swerving around in astonishment when she mutters about how he’s “Skipping off again?” loud enough for others to hear.

Ultimately, he does his own thing and she becomes one with her business for the two weeks.

They were to stay on this trip for two weeks: The first nine days were planned to focus on business, the rest had been planned to be spent as a personal vacation. But the prepaid plane tickets are roundtrip so Michelle’s only choice is to put up with all this until then. So, she and Peter don’t speak unless necessary.

He disappears and Michelle, who had been told that his investigations ended when all those from the meetings flew back—which had been two days ago now—attempts to contact him again. She plans to open with a promise not to talk about work for the rest of their stay, to not ask questions about his journalist career or investigations (not like he would answer them anyway). She plans to do whatever it would take to regain the peace and communication that she misses.

In her lone hotel room, Michelle's emotions steep day in and day out.

They have been on what is equal to “a break.”

The days pass by in a blur of contracts and keeping up image and arguments, policies, and she frets over the creases of her suit skirts and wings of her eyeliner and trying to uphold the air of having three times the more authority and dominance than those around her. She taps her pens loudly when she talks. She barks at Peter when he doesn’t write down a point that she thinks is important, when he doesn't write fast enough, and flicks her wrist, hardens her tone when she’s interrupted. She makes her presence _known_. She gets her points across, breaks down her perspective and plans to grade level understanding. She makes sure to have her hand-me-down watch from her predecessor polished and showing. Michelle is tunnel-vision during conferences and cautious about the topics at hand—about money, safety, expansion, her reputation—and everything else is secondary. She doesn’t turn off _work mode _until all the signatures are down and papers typed and she’s wearing sandals instead of heels and she’s had food and is holding a glass of wine.

Once, Peter reminds to call her second in command, Jasmine Freeman the company COO, but Michelle waves her hand, ordering him to do it for her. She’s still a bit angry over the demeaning passive aggressive comments received during the meeting that involve Michelle’s incapabilities because of her “feminine emotions” and her “slow-writing assistant.”

Another time, in a crunch, Peter had to run to the bathroom while in the middle of typing an email for her. When she returned and saw the lone laptop with the email unfinished, she became visibly upset.

And another time while descending in an elevator immediately after another roundtable meeting, Peter offhandedly mentions that they should do something together in a day—as it would be the anniversary of their fake relationship but she doesn’t remember. Michelle looked at him incredibly, hissing a decline because "_what are you, mad? There is so much to get done: records to request, a PowerPoint to make, to rethink my approach for tomorrow because everything just took a huge turn after today!"_

In the elevator, he advises for her to calm down. She rolls her eyes instead.

Michelle explains the importance of her reputation and how she is viewed and brainstorms how to improve her business. Peter mumbles that now everything they do feels like business.

Meeting dates decrease and the first week passes by on slow-motion speed. Soon, pressed shirts are replaced by pajamas and casual lounge outfits. But as work decreases, contact becomes minimal to barely existing. And it’s forgotten that their anniversary of _this_, of all of whatever _this _has become.

Michelle orders room service and forgets to call Peter back and reconstructs the air of authority whenever they cross—when she passes him in the hotel hallway on her way to the lobby, he’s returning in a noticeably torn t-shirt and dirty jeans. She forgets to turn her professional switch to _off_.

And it’s noticed.

There’s a change in their relationship—it’s been happening gradually but now it’s close to bursting the surface—and it’s finally asked about but by the lobby manager who assumes that the two are a couple when initially checking in.

Their changed feelings about their relationship is also noticed when Peter questions Michelle’s form of professionalism and her snapping back for him to just stick to his duties.

And it’s noticed by herself when he’s returning through the lobby in a damaged logo shirt—it wasn’t a simple rip but a missing sleeve, gashes torn in his sides, and he’s bruised. She’s reading near a window in the lobby when he enters so it’s impossible to not have seen him. There had been a noticeable change and distance growing between them but now Michelle begins to actively pay attention, and on the last night of their trip, she asks about it.

She'd been watching, waiting for him to enter every night until then, sometimes catching Peter returning at nine at night, eleven at night, two or three or four o'clock in the morning. There is never a consistent time to expect him. But Michelle isn’t as much concerned in the aspect of not knowing what he was doing—she knows it’s investigating, it has to be, she assumes—but she’s more concerned about where he’s going in order to come back with bruises and scrapes, and then of the one night he doesn’t come back at all.

On their last night at the hotel, Michelle’s reading the closed caption on the flat screen television in the hotel lobby as the clock strikes one-thirty in the morning. Sighing, she closes the book in her lap, too tired to continue waiting, and journeys to her room on the fourth floor. Just as she’s locked her door, there’s heavy footsteps trudging down the hall in her direction. Hearing the steps stop, more shuffling, and then the _beep_, _click _of the room next door unlocking, Michelle swings hers open to see Peter freeze, already looking over his shoulder in alarm. Slowly, he turns back forward, head down, pushing his door open.

“We need to talk,” she breaks the silence and days-long tension streak.

He pauses in place. Looks back at her, once. “We really don’t have to—”

“About all of this,” she interrupts, predicting he was going to ask '_about what'_. “Sorry. We need—we _should _talk about whatever _this is_.” She’s choosing her words carefully.

Peter is quiet. His hand moves from the door’s hand to flatten against the wood. Lays his forehead on its surface. He’s breathing heavily, tired.

“You’ve been gone for days and I need you—”

“I was busy,” he sighs the excuse, already prepared. He’s visibly exhausted. “...Working.”

“And your clothes are dirty and ripped.” She gestures, worry creeping into her words. In a lower tone, she asks, “Where do you go?_” _

And like expected, like routine, he answers, “Ma'am, I can’t tell—I’m not at liberty to say.”

It’s a lie and she knows it but doesn’t press.

Silence passes for a beat. Peter pushes his room’s door open further to leave inside, and then there is a weight against his back, an arm around his middle, her other hand turning his face to look at her though he fights against it. He’s bruised, she observes aloud—a fresh, bloody scar runs across the end of his eyebrow, a swollen top lip, and the blooming of faint bruises across his chin and left cheekbone. The tie to the wrinkled dress shirt he's still wearing is gone. She questions why he hasn’t answered the texts she sent about the flight home tomorrow. Peter presents a shattered and completely useless cellphone in response.

Her words a whisper, he winces at the near pain that he hears. “Where do you _go_, Peter?”

“I can’t tell you.” Chin bowed; he doesn’t look her in the eye.

Only the sound of a stranger’s door far down the expensive hotel hallway opening then closing fills the silence as she embraces him in a tight hug. She takes note that he doesn’t reciprocate.

“We need to talk,” she repeats. “About…about everything. We have to. A serious conversation, because this isn’t working.”

He hesitates for a long time before nodding against her shoulder.

She ends the hug and leans back against the doorframe of her opened door.

She starts. “Obviously business is very important to me. And there’s you with…whatever you do. But there’s a…um, a _priority_ for both of us we have to establish. It would make an understanding better. Make everything easier.”

Still quiet, Peter agrees.

And then the question is addressed: what takes the most priority in either’s life? 

The conversation is held there in the hallway with either’s back to their hotel room door. The conversation lasts for nearly thirty-four minutes. The results are unsurprising: that Michelle’s career takes a good percentage of the front seat of her concern, and likewise for Peter about his own job. But when the topic about their relationship is brought up, the personal side of it all, there is an undeniable hanging in the air.

It’s three in the morning and an hour later that each are staring into the darkness while in their separate beds, replaying the conversation in their heads, a deep swirling of regret making itself known in the pits of their guts. Earlier and during their talk, there had also been a noticeable pause with answering about their relationship. It hadn’t been denied that emotions have risen behind what was supposed to be a fake relationship towards her business partners. But when asked about _the priority _of their relationship altogether, both Michelle and Peter _hesitate _before an overflow of gurgitated rambles come out to save the other’s emotions.

There’s an undeniable hesitance. And then Michelle asks about the contact _Cat _in his phone, admits that she has seen it and asks who it is. Again, Peter hesitates, thinking of an answer, and that's when the last shred of Michelle’s inner security strips away.

There are a lot of secrets and there have been a lot of lies shared—that Peter only has the two jobs of being her assistant and investigating, and nothing about how high the priority of being Spider-Man is to him; that Michelle isn’t troubled by any of this, that they can handle this like adults. That there isn’t any reason to lie or withhold feelings and thoughts and have it eat them up from the inside. That she _hasn’t _allowed her own emotions to become the best of her. And then there are the lies they have been telling themselves since day one of everything.

The returning flight back is equally tense and quiet and empty. There is an empty pocket of air where warmer emotions had been held just five weeks ago.

A news report informs that the random sightings of the red-suited Spider-Man have stopped but sightings of Black Cat continue.

Somewhere in the city, through a burner phone, Cat texts to a contact named _Spider_. Three hours and thirteen texts later, he responds. 

It turns out that the guy who Spider-Man met up with the night before had friends who are now out for his neck.

Turning to Michelle, Peter sees that she’s fallen asleep through the flight. As the plane continues sliding across the stripway, someone taps her shoulder and wakes her.

Peter looks back at his text received under a contact named _Cat _and wonders how long he can continue this, or if Cat is right that his heroic acts will completely ruin his relationships.


	11. The one where their fake marriage is slipped to the public pt. 1

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Chapter prompt: Whoa whoa wait, Peter actually proposed to Michelle on TV in the spideychelle ceo au?!**
> 
> **Chapter prompt: I always wondered for Michelle and Peter in the CEO AU that since they are together in secret, if that would become a rumor within the office and then on the news. What would happen :0c**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the re-uploads of the main verse of this AU is almost completed. then you all will have the story thus far.
> 
> and yes, this chapter contains two prompts

Peter's proposal to Michelle is an admittingly late night idea, spur-of-the-moment, not-thought-out decision. It wasn't backed by the amount of forethought and precision as Michelle's fake-marriage plan, but instead possesses all of the spontaneous, adrenaline-driven bad habit that Peter still hadn't been able to shake off after all these years, and now he thinks he's made a nose-dive into one of the most controversial things made yet.

Well, of course after _agreeing_ to Michelle's fake-marriage. And then followed by the unforeseen and unpredictably thoroughly breeching their agreement of no feelings attached, ever.

Peter has never had the best track record in abiding rules.

The proposal doesn’t actually happen on purpose; it isn’t planned and hadn’t been a previous thought, consideration, or even an inkling in his mind before.

The proposal happens in front of cameras, broadcasted on television with zero editing to his words, his startled expression from being snuck up on while exiting a building, or his hesitation to answer. It literally happens because Peter opens his big mouth, and when he finds out that his recorded request for it to _not_ hit the headlines is altered so that it is _televised _instead of printed, it feels like all of Hell is breaking loose.

And because there was no way to backtrack his declaration of love for Ms. Watson while on camera, he presumes the best guess decision is to just run with it.

The reports twist his words into a declaration for an attention-grabbing slash surprise proposal.

Michelle has no inkling of this, and when she finds out about it, she's mostly _furious_ because every move and answer to the press who dare to ask have been planned and calculated in a way to withhold as much detail and preserve privacy. And she sees this slip-up as the most monumental mismanage that could have ever been made.

She feels angered. She feels betrayed. She feels backed into a corner and like a prey waiting for the predator to pounce at any given moment.

Besides this, Michelle also doesn't _know what_ to think about the proposal—because she has already begun having second thoughts about the fake-marriage, about her alarmingly rising emotions that were initially prohibited, and her own suspicions about Peter’s increasingly frequent absences on top of it all. And frankly, when she was first told about it—in person and as a warning, before she saw it televised—at first, she didn’t _believe_ him.

Only to find out that he had actually been completely, one hundred percent serious.

And now Peter's nervous because now he _has_ to go through with it—not that he would oppose to it, if the opportunity would have presented itself naturally—and, this isn't like the face-deep performance they have been parading around to sponsors and at functions; the audience has expanded to undesired occupants.

As Peter Parker watches the fruits of his hard-earned labor shrivel up and die, he’s fearfully dreading the choice words that his journalist boss back at The Bugle is going to shout at him.

As the seconds expand into days, Peter is definitely thinking about the proposal more than Michelle does. While she’s trying to control the damage by viewing it as another ploy and disguise to wear, he’s viewing it as the real deal.

And that's when it all dies.

Also, as if things couldn't escalade any more, she soon asks him to meet her parents. Peter gets a loud alert on his phone about _The Black Cat Burglar _and skips out to do Spider-Man business. He lies and says that he has to meet with his reporter colleagues. He ultimately forgets about her requested plans about meeting her parents—until too late.

* * *

* * *

The television is a blaring, bright distraction in the lunch break room—it serves as a plausible, believable excuse for attention as Peter tries to keep his gaze steady and focused on his pre-made Subway sandwich he ventured out to get just twenty minutes ago and now has half of that time left for break.

So far, it had been a rather good day—despite waking up two hours before his alarm due to continuing insomnia, ended up running late anyway, missed breakfast and forgetting to pack a lunch, Peter made the train on time and managed to notice en route between having whiplash to the headlines within newspaper stands and his boss emails him (his _actual _boss, the one who’s over his journalist career, Joe Robertson).

Then his cell phone chirps and a message blipping on screen before his phone _rings rings rings_ for an incoming call as in ominous warning, as if in alarm, as J. Jonah Jameson calls him instead of Robertson. And Peter tries in vain to have a discreet conversation with Jameson’s booming voice in one ear as he sprints across the building's lobby into a crowded elevator.

This day started off _moderately well_. Because as soon as he gets to his floor, Peter literally trips ten steps after exiting the elevator. His phone's screen cracks and the cardboard back of his notebook bends.

He arrives two minutes late, with a slightly frazzled look, and is criticized by his temporary boss as she runs hands over his suit to smooth it, her eyes biting and nose turned. There’s a department meeting today that he’s to attend at her side to take notes on. Her office door is wide open. As her hands smooth over the collar of his simple navy suit, they stop at his shoulders. Squeezes lightly, barely noticed. Gives a friendly pat on his chest. Her eyes linger. A hand raises; lips press together. “Professional,” she iterates.

He nods. “Right.”

“And fix your hair.” (It no longer styled smoothly.)

“Right.”

That had been over three hours ago. And the meeting had gone fine, by the way, and had indeed been professional—even though this crowd talked very much, and among themselves more than Ms. Watson and her assistant. But Peter hadn’t thought much of it then, and he’s uncertain if Michelle is still pondering over it now.

But what _really_ jumped out to him had been the slip of his name from one colleague: It hadn’t been a bother—he’s the relatively fresh meat, unforeseen to be working this high up as his first job within the company. (Peter always says that it’d just been _luck _that he got the job; he always tosses everything to _luck_.)

What really grabs his attention and raises his discomfort is the conversation he's currently hearing from outside the break room.

Peter's languid munching comes to a halt at hearing an indication about him spoken in a conversation just outside the door. It’s far enough where he _shouldn’t _hear, but Matt and Joanne (if he’s picking out the voices correctly) whisper so harshly and the small table he’s sitting at isn’t _that_ far from the exit, and armed with his sensitive hearing, he couldn't _not _hear. It’s shocking and a little hurtful because in the many, many months that he’s worked to integrate into the company and staff's social circles, Peter has made some good companions, some rather good connections, and if it turns out to be Matt and Joanne, it would be disappointing to him because he thought he'd built a well-enough relationship with them at a bar after work some two years ago to not to be stabbed in the back by them.

Peter slows with eating his sandwich, swallows. With it still in his hands, he listens further, catching broken pieces of a conversation about “picking favorites” and how “everything just can’t be a coincidence.” His brows furrow as a woman—probably isn’t Joanne, he thinks—voices how “he’s always following around like a—I don’t know—a lost puppy or something.”

“Well that’s in the job description,” a man who’s definitely not Matt, as Peter concludes, speaks up.

“No, no, that’s not what I mean. It’s like…I don’t know…there’s _something else_. You didn’t see what I saw—”

“No shit.”

“The way they were looking at each other…and touching. Like—you, you seen the movies, right?”

“If I was basing everything off of movies, I wouldn’t really believe it either.”

“Oh, shut up, Brett!”

Peter wrinkles his nose at the name.

“No man looks at a lady _that way _and it’s only _professional,_” the woman continues. She’s countered with how, in the office, the two subjects always seem separate and have never dragged personal issues in to work. “Yeah,” she goes, “but I just _know. _…I don’t want to _assume,_ but…”

“That’s what we’ve all been doing this whole time,” Brett adds.

Another man speaks. “Yeah, but you have gotta admit that the timing when they were both absent, that was _uncanny._”

“You all are just annoying buzzards,” Brett now rebukes.

“But it’s interesting though, isn’t it—?”

“_And _a breach of contract,” Brett butts. He sounds intent on bringing the conversation to an end.

At the table, Peter’s heart is racing.

“It’s _risky_, yeah, but I wouldn’t blame him. I mean, she does look rather _nice _on a good day, if you know what I mean.” The man's smirk can be heard in his speech. “She’s pretty for a CEO. I’m _still_ shocked.”

Peter’s pulse is a jackhammer. _Oh no,_ he thinks. _Oh no. _

“And what’s that supposed to mean,” a different woman jumps in, shutting him up.

Sandwich forgotten, Peter's vision spaces out as he looks toward the large flat screen television mounted high on the opposite wall but doesn't register anything it is playing, continuing to eavesdrop.

In the hall near the break room door, one set of footsteps walk away but not before its owner mentions something about _money_ and _a bet_ made that Peter doesn’t quite catch the details of.

A person asks another’s suspicions about “How long do you think it’s been?”

And then another person mentions how she once noticed both subjects of their conversation were wearing _wedding rings _one day but then never again.

Suspicions grew, Peter’s heart thumps in his ears, his stomach and chest runs cold, and then he doesn’t realize the last ten minutes of his lunch break is over until his wristwatch beeps, yanking him from his thoughts and he _swears_ he jumps three inches in the air. Absentmindedly, he quickly cleans his area, crumpling up the wrapping paper, shoving it and his sandwich inside an already-stuffed trashcan, suddenly unable to stomach it any longer.

_Oh no no no no no!! _

He feels the panic worsening. He has tunnel vision. Doubles back for his cup that he forgot. Is rushing to the door, hearing the talking end and hoping to—he doesn’t really know what he's hoping for but he has to get out of here. Now. He has to find out who it is. He has leave. He needs _answers_.

As he’s hurriedly approaching the doorway, two colleagues enter, all three stopping short, the two standing in Peter’s way of exit. The room is immediately embarrassed, immediately _awkward_.

Peter’s jaw sets. One of the two men in front of him clears his throat, greets Peter with a sheepish, “Parker! Hey—hey… I, uh, we didn’t see you there, buddy… Uh.” His hand raises, pauses in the air, awkwardly clasps Peter’s shoulder in departure. “See you ‘round.”

Peter’s head bobs in an automatic goodbye. Doesn’t say anything. Raises the straw from his cup to drink so he doesn’t have to speak. The men—Lenny and Simon, he remembers—step to the sides as Peter forcefully shoulders past them.

He doesn’t want to speak to anyone for the rest of the day.

And to add to it, Michelle is out of her office for the rest of the day, completely unaware and blindsided.

For the remaining hours at work, Peter forces a strained but content face and smiles politely to all that pass and he tries to act as if the biggest mistake of his life isn’t about to come out.

* * *

Luckily, thankfully, he doesn’t hear about any more suspicions, but when Michelle returns, he makes sure to keep his distance—in words and actions—and it is done so uncharacteristically that she raises a brow.

Even though it isn't spoken or explicitly indicated, he _knows_ that _she knows_ something is up and he’ll tell her eventually, he will, only when he’s for certain that the rumors floating low under the radar about an “affair in the office” are about him. Because while a few bits of gossip had mentioned the company’s CEO, Peter knows that he isn’t the only man she converses with or spends a good amount of time near. And he uses this as an alibi, a cover when he's approached by Brett and Lenny.

For three days Peter basically ghosts Michelle, remaining strictly professional until a Wednesday afternoon on his day off. He’s managed to skip over to her apartment and there he explains everything: all he’s heard and who he suspects. It doesn’t go over well.

Her way of freaking out is shutting down, no longer talking, quietly standing and leaving the room to lean over a counter and just breathes. Michelle’s way of dealing with this is pouring herself a small portion of vodka and orange juice, and thanking him, indicating he could leave her be, takes another look at her glass and pours herself more when Peter closes the front door.

He doesn’t have to ask about how things are to be now. It’s obvious; he already knows.

* * *

However, no one suspects to see the employee's suspicions _confirmed_ three weeks later since Peter's overhearing, in the form of info squeezed into the short recaps of last night's news on local broadcast in the early morning. What is shown is a candid photograph of both Peter Parker and Michelle Watson entering a function held by other big wigs. The photo had obviously been taken without their knowledge, as neither show any indication that they noticed the camera and Peter is guzzling down a beer. Another photo shows on screen and it’s a closer, still secretly taken photo of them: they’re both laughing at a joke made by a speaker at the function, but of course the newscaster twists it to have a romantic undertone, and a hand of the two is zoomed into on screen. “And apparently Ms. Watson, a local CEO, attended the function with a new beau? Wedding rings on the two had been spotted weeks ago at—”

And to make it worse, Michelle had been conversing a rather important event with three other guests who hold high positions in partner branches when one notices her on the television high on the wall and who clicks off the mute.

To make it worse even more, one guest had been a woman Peter overheard speaking her suspicions about the rumor a week before, and who Michelle sat down and debunked the rumors to her face.

Michelle’s eyes are spinning so she closes them, not yet ready to see the expressions of her guests.

When Peter finds out by himself, he’s _told _by Gregory from the PR department gleefully approaching Peter’s desk.


	12. The one where their fake marriage is slipped to the public pt. 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Chapter prompt: CEO prompt: Everyone knows Michelle busted her ass to get to the top, but Peter wasn't there to witness it. So, seeing MJ work not just at work, but everywhere she goes non-stop really puts it into perspective for him just how much Michelle earned her spot at the top.**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _immense thanks to those who drop comments to let me know if you're enjoying this story. and I'm glad that you all are so far! to those commenting about wondering how things are going to pan out now: the drama continues here too, for the two, but it doesn't stop in this short but not-so-sweet chapter..._

It’s not easy being in Michelle’s position—despite owning a Beville electric tea kettle, the expensive perfumes in her bathroom cabinet, the all-organic foods in her refrigerator, the memory foam and thousand-count bed sheets she owns in her large condo home that is on one of the higher floors in the building, and earns more money than she ever thought she would receive.

More precisely, Michelle’s life isn’t _ easy_—with the skepticism, the second glances, the second assumptions about her, about her capability, her credibility, and she has to fight and prove her point several times over. It's a continuous never-ending cycle.

Why? Because she’s still having to convince others of her worth, of her humanity and value even with her job occupation which she acquired by the _skin of her teeth_. And going by the increase in business and how she manages to keep the company afloat, her treatment is undeserving—it’s told in her cutthroat manner, her high expectations, high standards held with no exceptions to anything lower, and she keeps her chin held high just the same, her spine straight and tall, her lipstick bold and her eyes stern and knife-sharp like her words, like her fingernails—sometimes painted and natural, sometimes acrylics—that dig into skin with _ force _ and a _ command _to snip short the questions about whether she’s “right for the job or not.”

Michelle’s worked _ hard _ to get where she is.

Her job life isn’t easy—and of course it’s equally easy to assume otherwise with the newest appliances she owns, the size of her office, the quality of her clothing, the realness of her leather purse, the prices on her stash of alcohol, and the gems embedded in her jewelry.

Peter has seen her in many scenarios, has seen many sides of her, but vulnerable—to see _ the _ Michelle J. Watson as _ vulnerable—_would be something that would have never, ever crossed his mind.

Not when he’s overheard his coworkers questioning her say-so, not when he’s witnessed those equal to her status challenge her authority, when she’s cut down by her equals time and time again. He’s seen it at the office, at the first gathering he attended under the guise and title of her _fiancé_, at the restaurants when the manager is called on her because she ordered something with a price they didn’t think _ her kind _ would be able to pay for. Peter watches how she carries herself with dignity and dominance, and she knows what she wants, how she wants it; he’s seen the way she instructs others and puts her foot down in order to get it. And he’s seen when a man—a stranger—both hits on her and shit-talks the unknown CEO of her company, and Michelle then responds with a cheap smile and informs that _ she’s _ that head.

Sometimes Peter wonders if Michelle has an _ off _ switch that lasts when she walks out her front door. He worries it.

Peter worries because he's seen the wall-to-wall shelves stuffed with books behind her office desk, has seen the tall bookcase in her living room and the small tower of novels on her bedside table and the folded corners, tags, and bookmarks throughout their pages. So he _ knows _ she’s well-read, intelligent, and that she’s capable and deserves her position. She’s earned it—if anyone does, she has, for sure.

So when she sees herself on the TV screen being broadcasted, of her secret business being a topic discussed between news anchors for all of the city—and more—to see, Peter can’t help but feel _ bad._

Gregory from the PR department comes around the corner to tell him with a smile that “The CEO is on TV!” and an eyebrow waggle. Peter hadn’t gotten the inclination immediately, not until the colleague turns his back and Peter’s heart _ stops,_ his stomach _ drops,_ and he forgets his station to briskly walk to Michelle’s office.

He regains his bearings in time to stop at the door. Inside, he remembers that a meeting is happening inside. The door is cracked open, so he peers inside to see that there’s no meeting going on. Through the opened door he watches Michelle standing at her desk with two men and a woman he doesn’t recognize but now they don’t work here and are likely of important positions elsewhere. Both are giving _very judgmental _stares to Michelle before they continue their discussion. And what they say isn’t nice.

Michelle is first questioned, and then she’s accused—there’s confusion first, then shock, betrayal, and now chastising. She backs up to her wide desk and leans back against the edge, folds her arms, slides her feet out in front, and tilts her chin down. For once, she can’t face someone else. It appears as if she’s _ ashamed_, Peter thinks, but _almost_.

The television mounted high on the opposite wall is still on mute so Peter has no clue of the _ exact details _ of what they know. The fake wedding ring rests in his inner breast pocket. From the limited view through the door's space, he can see mostly Michelle, a man and one of the women, the other is hidden from view by the door.

He tries to eavesdrop but all he hears are questions about “_Why,_ Ms. Watson?” And “Whatever made you do this? What were you _thinking?_ What _ have _ you been thinking?” And “This is completely against contract.” And finally, “Why would you put yourself at risk like this?”

A woman inside glances at the opened door and Peter jumps away, almost caught.

He's so zoned in on the conversation inside that he doesn't catch Jasmine Freeman, Michelle's right hand, passing through far down the hall, steps pausing and witnessing his act but not saying a word and continue on her way.

As Peter steps away from the office door so he has no risk of being seen, his heartbeat is _ pounding _ in his throat and in his ears as he continues listening from against the wall. There’s a brief period of silence as if the guests inside are waiting for her reply, but Michelle he doesn’t give one.

Peter’s heart sinks further.

“You’re on TV, dammit!”

A pause passes.

“Ms. Watson; please. There _ has _ to be a sensible explanation for this.” Then as if considering, the woman softly adds, “There better be.”

Another brief pause happens.

“You need to come up with a good excuse here. _ What _ were you possibly thinking?”

Finally, Michelle answers, “A lot.”

“Well... What does that mean?”

“It means what I said: it took a lot of thinking—_considering_,” she corrects herself.

“To date an _ employee?_ And one who's _ beneath _ you?”

“We’re married,” Michelle makes the excuse, not immediately registering her slip-up. Not thinking at all, in fact, like her mind has shutdown but her mouth works on its own.

“From what it looks like on the _ news_, you’re only _ just _ engaged.” One of the visiting women takes a moment to think before asking, “Is there something _else_ you’re keeping from us? Something else the board needs to know?”

“No.”

“Watson—”

“You asked and I gave you an answer: there’s nothing else being hidden.”

Peter strains his ears and picks up those words. His stomach drop and freeze over with every reply she gives. And it feels like he’s on the bad end of confession. He feels _ played _ because _nothing_ she’s saying is _ genuine_.

“You know good and well this is against policy. This will go in HR’s records,” is spoken from within Michelle Watson’s office.

Suddenly her tone _ changes_, head lifting slightly, and she's staring daggers into all three standing in front of her. “I’m the goddamn CEO. What can Human Relations do about me?” It’s her being appalled; it’s a challenge, a dare.

Peter perks up. He thinks about the interview he’s suspecting is being replayed on the television—of when reporters ambushed him exiting the building of a sponsor’s headquarters and threw the question about him and the CEO seemingly at random, out of left field in between questions about the company’s relations with the authority (relating to the scandal). It’s when he made the biggest mistake and admitted he planned to propose to CEO Ms. Watson.

Inside her office, the two opposing Michelle go quiet.

“He won’t be an employee for long,” she blurts, still not thinking and her vision focusing on a decorative piece across the room. “Yes, we’re getting married still.”

This time Peter’s chest jumps for another reason—one not particularly joyful.

The three now stop ripping into Michelle. One admits that, “No matter the situation, business comes first. And since we’re here, let’s negotiate an agreement.”

One of them takes the television remote, presses a button to turn it off, and the sounds of them all sitting in chairs travels to Peter, still standing near the door.

Under his breath, curses run off Peter’s tongue.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _want another chapter for tomorrow (Sunday) night? Dropping a comment will surely, always help! (i am a desperate gal always accepting critics or comments or any words, really)_


	13. The one where Michelle gives Peter his three weeks notice

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Chapter prompt: ok so since we had peter visit mj appartment in the ceo au, could we have mj visiting peter's place? it's not really planned but maybe something happened and it was the nearest place, or he couldn't make it to work and she had to go and see him or whatever you can think of, I know you'll come up with something good if you feel inspired! <3**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 👀  
as promised if the previous chapter were to receive comments, here is another re-upload chapter. this chapter takes place in the future, a few weeks after everything was solved. it does have a little spoiler but nothing too bad and nothing too revealing about the 'hows' and 'whys.'
> 
> 👀

Michelle’s stomach clenches and quivers as she proceeds up the cement stairs to the fifth apartment building floor. Her shoes click with every step. Her vision is cloudy, slightly burning from tears, and the clenching in her stomach worsens; the stone-heavy void from fear opens in her chest, collapses, caves in on itself. She sniffs; it doesn’t help. The once-clear processing of her mind is a train wreck of shortening nerves and white-hot emotion. She’s teetering on the knife-edge from crying. A floor below, furious thundering of several heavy footfalls are after her.

She’s sprinted up three flights of stairs and her heartbeat’s erratic. Her hair is a mess of frizz at the fault of the weather's heavy humidity. The tears welling in her eyes worsen hearing the baritone voices hounding and cursing for her, berating her, belittling her for refusing their advances. The white tracksuit she wears is lightly damp by the drizzling rain on her way here.

Huffing for breath but not stopping, she's running up the fourth flight of stairs when she the footsteps slow, falter, and stop at the sound of her jingling keys he passed the third flight of stairs, and she hears the footsteps behind slow, stop at the sound of her jingling keys—a ploy, but one she’s grateful to have worked—and the men's footsteps retreat as she makes it to the fourth floor, quiets her footsteps and continues to the fifth out of the seven floors of the apartment building.

Once at the fifth floor, she bends over with her hands on her knees, struggles to regain her breath and steady her heart rate. During that time, she focuses on the city's sounds coloring the atmosphere from below, her brain still very frazzled and buzzing with alarm.

After enough time to regain her composure, Michelle leans against the building's wall, tosses her hair over her shoulder, strands sticking to her neck from sweat, and gives one final gasp for air to steady herself. The tears that had leaked from the corners of her eyes are quickly dabbed away with the sleeves of her tracksuit-sweater, inadvertently coloring the white clothing with faint smudges of eye shadow. One of her large golden hoop earring is tangled in her wide curls, she finds, when gathering her hair to tie in an up-do.

There’s a leather portfolio case tossed on the ground when she finally stopped; the case is what she reaches for once regaining her composure. Emotions are still strong but at least she isn’t as hysterical as before or hyperventilating.

Michelle had gotten away at the expense of losing her faux golden wristwatch—a present gifted from the kindness of her predecessor—not putting up a fight when one of the men demanded it from her wrist. (She hadn't been in the mood to put up any sort of argument, and besides, she can buy another watch if she ever so wishes.) Thanks to the tall umbrella she is carrying with her, she had managed to fend off the men well enough to run.

On the fifth floor of the apartment building and standing outside the door belonging to the person she's been dreading to meet, Michelle runs both hands up her forehead and into her hairline. Her makeup feels blotted now and caked due to the air’s humidity and her fleeing.

Her emotions are still heavy and adrenaline still racing from events prior to this day as she slowly takes one last encouraging breath, secures the leather portfolio in the bends of her elbows, and trudges up the final flight of stairs. Unzips the top of the portfolio and thumbs through the papers and resume inside. Inhales a shaky, steadying breath once she raises a fist to knock.

The loud shifting of Peter’s emotions—first irksome, and then surprise—when he swings open his door, and the furious undercurrent of the still-healing purple bruise curving across the bone of his right eye, which Michelle tries and fails not to stare at too much, does not slip past her.

He’s staring, she registers, faintly. He’s squinting, confused, and he’s _ suspicious_. Of course he’s suspicious.

Her grip on the portfolio in her arms tighten.

Peter’s matching alarmed and skeptically confused greeting sounds too loud in the empty hallway: “Michelle? I was just—” He pauses to swallow, seemingly out of breath. “I thought I was still meeting you at the store around—around the corner...?”

Her eyes briefly drift down to see he’s half-dressed.

Michelle stares at him for several long moments before speaking. “I got chased by some..._inconvienieces_.” Peter’s responding expression is of confusion, and he’s about to question '_what does that mean,' _so, quickly and still shaken, a little urgency sneaks into her voice with, “Can I come inside?”

Peter blinks but steps aside briskly. She waits until he’s bolted and locked the door before continuing. To herself, she finds it ironic that he has so much security and so little of visible importance in his apartment—but then again, it makes sense.

Why to this, she now knows.

Because, remember, secrets and _lies_ always find a way to the light.

Michelle turns around to him with her feet feeling like they're made of cement and she's gripping the portfolio near protectively to her chest.

He’s half-dressed in a semi-formal shirt over a pair of baggy sweatpants. She catches a sliver of patterned red between the waistband and the buttoned shirt. She doesn't register the hardened expression she now wears but _he_ certainly does, and gives an appropriate confused furrow of his eyebrows.

Several more moments of silence pass and he _tries_ to act nonchalant—and like he’s not out of breath, like there isn’t the faintest smell of something wretched lingering on him, and attempts to hide the visible cuts on his knuckles by putting his hand behind his back. That red cloth peeks out from the loose collar of his shirt and Peter swallows.

Michelle smoothes what’s left of the lipgloss across her lips. Calmly, she begins after what feels like an eternity: “Felicia’s arrested.”

And there’s a part of her that’s appalled at the astonishment he gives, and a part of her is _ furious._ Still, she keeps her hands around the portfolio because it’s the only thing seeming to ground her. Her head is spinning, but luckily not as badly as before, in the beginning of this all revealing itself.

Michelle nods, and answers his questions to what happened. “Spi—it was _Spider-Man_ who—who brought her in.” On the television, local news channel had broadcasted her old friend and coworker shot after shot, recognizable to Michelle because she’s always known her ex-friend was into wigs and dressing elaborately.

Peter is quiet; asks if Michelle is ok, picking up on her unsteady nerves.

In answer, she only blinks. “_Spider-Man_ brought her in two days ago.” She puts emphasis on the name again.

He’s still unsure and his tone is concerned about her, so Michelle adds, “Are you feeling better now? You were out for three days. ...You look it.” Her chin nods in his direction about his frazzled look.

She marvels at his collected composure; he tells that he’s feeling much better now, and thanks her for asking.

He's acting as if he has no idea what she's trying to imply. He acts as if her glares and directing with the hero's name is going right over his head.

Peter asks if she wants something—to sit; some water. Casually asks what she had meant by “an earlier inconvenience.” Calmly questions her aloud about her emotions over her friend and the news.

“Don’t act like that is _anywhere_ in _your_ area of interest.” Her stance is composed but the sharpness to her words catch him off guard, and he displays it, always very expressive. Michelle backtracks on what she's said, apologizes for it but it's lightly spoken and rushed. “I was informed that the investigation is coming to a close,” she continues. “Some detectives and police are going to look into it now—with the—the—you know.”

_ The dead bodies _ she had planned to say but couldn’t. Never did she plan for things to escalate as far as they did. For once, she finally understands why companies pay to cover up incidences and crimes. They make the company look bad, yes, but the mental and emotional weight of having to see it every day for weeks on end can take a toll.

Inhaling, her words gradually lose their hardened edge. “So your job here is done,” and she finally extends the leather portfolio to Peter.

Inside are the copies of his resume and other papers needed for his unofficial hiring, she narrates. It also containing whatever papers and Post-Its and chewed-on pens he belongs which she could find on his desk; had scooped them into the portfolio and zip up—this she doesn’t tell. The portfolio now contains every blatant piece and clue and remembrance of him.

Peter takes the portfolio, bewildered.

“I thought it would be better to do this in private instead of in public,” is what she uses as an excuse. Her fingers fidget behind her back.

“Private? I don’t understand, Miche—”

“The guise’s over, Mr. Parker.”

The abrupt swing back to formal honorifics trips him up.

“You can stop now. Just...” Her words are more stone and steady than she expects them to come out as. And maybe she’s reading too much into it—because it's been a long time, truly, since she’s felt even remotely like she’s being laid out exposed and emotionally clawed raw while risking all she’s got. Michelle is probably reading too much into it, surely, when she speaks, “You don’t have to be Spider-Man over here anymore for us.”

Perhaps, she’s _definitely_ reading too much into when Peter’s face doesn’t even give the faintest _flicker_ of concern, or betrayal, or fear, or _ exposure_.

There’s a chance she’s been reading too much into it when he so clearly states, “What are you talking about, Michelle?”

And she gives back, “You don’t have to keep up the act. I won’t say anything. I promise. You’re as deep in this as I am.”

_Perhaps_ she’s reading too much into it when he just stands and stares, and stares, and _ stares_.

She _isn’t_ reading too much into it when there’s a final request of, “I need the ring back.” And when he disappears into his bedroom and returns, tellingly silent, Michelle adds, “It’s not anything you did.” This is a blatant lie.

Her eyes lower and she nods to the peek of his super suit barely seen from beneath his clothing.

Still, Peter doesn’t speak. She wonders if there is anything he wants to say. Is he going to fight her? Rebuke her? Blame her?

Instead, his eyes go wide and his head bows, metaphoric tail between his legs like he’s about to be scolded, like he’s about to do something shameful and he’s worried, _ guilty_.

“’Chelle...I’m so sorry. I just didn’t want you to—I wasn’t—”

“_Watson_, please,” she corrects.

He swallows. Hesitates. Tension hangs in the air. “Does this,” he hesitates more. “Does this mean you—”

“This can serve as the beginning of your three week's notice. Three weeks to be generous because you have a lot to think about and our reputation isn't exactly _great_ right now.” She'd interrupted on purpose, unable to continue suffocating in this feeling and _needing_ it to end, to escape to the safety of her own home. “Would you walk me downstairs, please?”

There’s no verbal reply—only more guilty hesitance because he knows there's nothing he can say to take it all back. He gives a head nod, as a silent bow, obedient to this final order.

The walk down the flights is weighted with too much unspeakable feelings and untreated wound from secrets. The only noise is the rain, their slow footsteps, and the house keys jingling in the pocket of his sweatpants.

Michelle is grateful the band of men from before have moved on and are nowhere to be seen.

She waves down a taxi, tall umbrella held tight in one hand. Peter doesn’t help her. She wouldn’t want him to.

This leave, this abrupt severing is extremely unfamiliar and the resulting pair are emotionally distraught.


	14. The one where Michelle is unknowingly uploaded on YouTube

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Chapter prompt: for the ceo au, which I AM LOVING BY THE WAY, now that mj knows he’s spiderman, she finds herself in the same place where the gang of men were chasing her but this time she’s backed into an alley and she hits one but that only infuriates the rest and she’s too weak and tired to fight back because she’s sad obviously and then enter spider-man**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Re-posted because I doubt anyone saw or read this last weekend.
> 
> This chapter follows after Michelle found out Peter's secrets of him being Spider-Man, and using his alter ego to make her a pawn in his investigations. So, this chapter shows a little more relationship angst post-breakup and post-investigation but there aren't major spoilers.

Michelle peers out at the grey concrete sidewalks, slick wet by drizzling rain; at the city reflections in the tinted windows of passing cars and taxis and the shopping windows and corporate restaurants; watches raindrops splash across the asphalt off of beaten sneakers and shiny dress loafers and kiddie rain boots, collecting in small puddles to be jumped into or splash unfortunate passersby.

Water glistens across Michelle's turquoise and white sneakers; she can feel her dark stockings growing more damp by the minute. A hand reaches to turn the ghost of the ring that used to be on her third finger, a tick she’s developed over the many months; instead, her hand finds bare skin and so it lowers to grip the polyester material of her skirt. She’s waiting at a crosswalk, surrounded by the bustling city folk.

A child beside her twirls a sun-yellow umbrella decorated with flower prints. Michelle’s own is simple, clear, and large sized. Lately, she’s been considering purchasing a colored one. She would rather not be able to see the skyscrapers above and would rather remain ignorant to whatever may be up there instead.

_Whoever _may be up there. Sometimes. Maybe.

_Fuck._

Still. Still, Michelle waits for the crosswalk sign to change, ignores the bump into her shoulder as a man hurries past, carrying an impossibly large number of what looks like blueprints in his arms. Michelle’s foot gets stepped on, and she’s starting to feel the makeup on her face due to the humidity.

And she’s fine. She’s always been. She’s got to be.

She’s _fine_. There’s no other way to be.

Watching the man run hurriedly across the sidewalk, she can’t help but feel a spark of concern that his blueprints would get water damage by the light rain. The man pauses once, stepping on a loosened shoestring, then continues on. Once on the other side of the street, Michelle takes this opportunity to pick up her pace, but before she can close a little of the distance, wanting to offer her umbrella, the man runs a hand over his terribly done comb-over, repositions his glasses, and catches his ID badge slipping from his front shirt pocket; it reads that he’s an employee at _Oscorp_. Michelle hopes Harry’s workers won’t be too harsh on the man.

Speaking of Harry, Michelle’s still in good connections with him, a grateful gesture bridged for her over two year ago. Since it was formed, Michelle has had several meetings with the head of Oscorp for various subjects and lunch meetings and planned projects turned successful. In all, Harry has been the most proactive business partner she's ever had. To say the least, Michelle is grateful—for this as well as for the first time in a long while she’s made an acquaintance who understands her work struggles.

Glancing at her wristwatch, Michelle tries not to think about how late she’s now running for her meeting with Harry Osborn.

And she knows it's her own fault—while out for lunch she chose to catch the tail ends of the lunch rush at a high-end restaurant she’s never been to instead of going somewhere less crowded and more familiar. She's trying to branch out from her norm; she’s been doing that rather well lately.

Raising a hand to brush away flyaway hairs, her pace increases through the busy sidewalks, weaving through slow walkers and shouldering past those who take up the entire sidewalk. Stepping off a curb and accidentally in a small puddle, the dirty water soaks her pantyhose from the knee down and she makes a mental note to ask a Oscorp employee for a hand towel to drape over her legs to dry.

Surprisingly, this isn't the first time she's run so incredibly late—which is odd for her, knowing that Ms. Michelle J. Watson values _punctuality_. Her recent slacking is due to her recent emotional turbulence, and she knows this. And she's also grateful that Harry has been so understanding and not ask thorough questions.

Like Michelle doesn't tend to run tardy, Harry isn't one to ask for or worry about _details_ and makes a very unpleasant upturned "U" of his mouth whenever Michelle has started giving an explanation: that her ride was barricaded by traffic due to a car pileup, that the heel of her shoe broke, because a kid sneezed snot on Michelle's blazer, of her own self-imposed crying session bleeding over into their meeting time.

She doesn’t like thinking about the last one. Despite it being three weeks after everything—after the arrest and trial of her once-college roommate, friend, and coworker Felicia Hardy; after realizing the _pawn _she'd unknowingly been to her recent ex-employee, Peter Parker; of stripping herself bare and honest only to find out his lies that were just _so much more _than she expected or could handle; after being held on trial, questioned about her involvement in the rumors about her company and then the dead bodies and the photographs taken of them together, and her having to _lie _that she hadn’t known either of the masked figures of Spider-Man and one unknown “fleeing the scene” (aka Black Cat); after everything fell into place and she _understood the weight _of it all and it coming crashing, hitting her with an avalanche of information.

It’s now after the ending of all of this, and yet, three weeks later when its finally sunk in, Michelle had sat crying into a box of tissues. Like a broken tape, the scenes loop in her mind—of the last time she was face to face with Felicia, testifying; of the hurt look in Peter’s eyes when they last spoke; of when she met up with Harry those three weeks later and he wordlessly depicted her still slightly swollen, pinkish eyes by sliding her a spare box of Kleenex and ordering a glass of lemon water for her. He hadn’t pressed on it; Michelle's relieved.

He never asked on it but the topic of his old friend does come up while the news plays on low volume in the background during today's meeting—Michelle’s head is bowed, not wanting to see the story for the umpteenth time—and when questioned, she _feels _ how dry and wrung and _fake _her smile is when she answers, “We’ve separated.”

All of this had been a string of lies she was ready, _relieved _to put to rest. She’s definitely relieved, as she’s repeated to herself between tearful blubbering, trying to forget the silent glare of _revenge _Felicia held. Michelle tells herself that she is relieved this is all over, that she’s no longer in the middle of this fiasco.

She's fine; there's no other way she can be in this situation, despite the heartache, the tears, the whiplashing feel of betrayal, and ignoring her parents' phone calls and voicemails of concern.

Michelle _can't_ repeat this again, and so she closes herself for good—she tells herself. There’s no other way _to_ be.

* * *

> Time skip: a month and a week after Harry's meeting, after everything is over.

If she hadn't been so preoccupied and busy, this probably would have resulted differently.

But then again, even that is her fault, increasing her work load as a means of personal distraction.

Her phone sits alone and on vibrate but she doesn’t receive messages. There’s a series of month-old texts she hasn’t replied to that are still left on _Read_. She’s losing the physical tick to twist or feel for the now-non existent engagement ring around her finger. The _In _and _Out _baskets on her desk are kept filled. The crystal paper weight she was gifted long ago has been moved from her desk to inside the drawer of the vacant assistant desk outside her office—it out of sight, out of mind. The scarf she'd been gifted as a birthday present sits in the back of her closet behind a large suitcase she rarely uses. All photographs and videos have been deleted off of her phone—all evidence and memories and things used for afterthought. However, they’re all automatically backed on iCloud.

Michelle smooths a hand over her hair, fly strays and edges held down. She wears lipstick, the kind that sticks and leaves faint prints; she’d grabbed it on accident this morning, reaching for a different shade.

It’s been over a month since the fiasco involving her company was wrapped up and put to rest, but elsewhere the damage is still being cleaned up.

On the news, her company's fiasco was featured on the local news station in a quick five to seven minute spot; it was made a minimal story, which she's glad for, the results and culprits of the wrongdoings had been stretched in a longer piece.

From seeing this, Michelle had been phoned over Skype by her previous boss, the one she inherited her company from. And by sheer good luck and fortune, she wasn’t skinned alive when told that she was to meet up at her predecessor’s grand house back in his home country of Romania. After explaining to the best of her ability and being called out for her ill-thought choices, not all in English, Michelle is given a pep talk, feeling much like the ill-experienced young adult she used to be.

A month and a half has passed since everything ended for her and she’s still in the process of recovering and processing, of not having to answer to every reporter who shoves a microphone or voice recorder in her face, of now being able to sleep soundly, of not having the skin-crawling warning that someone is watching her, and of looking up or catching a flash of patterned red suit watching her from a distance as she walks home at night—it was a little comforting and reassuring at first and the act was _so like him_ that she couldn’t get too mad about it, but she also couldn’t tell him _thank you_.

She couldn’t speak to him at all. She _can't_. The hardest part about a breakup is the part where you have to keep yourself strong and steadfast.

Which is why Michelle _ignores_ Peter's phone calls within the immediate first week, and why she swiped over his texts and threw the notes he’d leave for her immediately in a trash bin. Because she has a business to run and meetings to coordinate and she just _can’t _get mixed up in this _hero mess _anymore. She isn’t supposed to talk to him anymore; she'd promised herself.

As Michelle smooths the front of her burgundy blouse and skirt, she glances at the empty assistant desk on her way to the elevator. There’s been applications sent out looking for a new one; she’s received a few recommendations from employees and she’s in the process of sifting through the applied.

Michelle turns a corner, shakes her head, chin raising. Her cellphone shows a news story notification, what she’s started to use when things began _escalating_. It shows there’s a robbery en route to her home. She doesn’t worry about it, choosing to be chauffeured.

Michelle Watson doesn’t talk to Peter Parker anymore. Her predecessor advised that she would never get over it if she didn’t.

* * *

It's late evening, the sun quickly setting over the horizon of the city. Michelle makes a stop at a Jimmy John’s on the way home because she hasn’t eaten since ten that morning and she can’t quite find the will to cook. The large, clear umbrella twirls in one hand, the other scrolling through notes sent to her via email. She'd chosen to walk the rest of the way to avoid the heavy traffic.

The rain's momentarily stopped and the sidewalks aren't as busy currently.

She’s got her attention focused on her phone screen and doesn’t register the puddle her sneakers barely miss. The sky overhead is a lazy overcast of grey stretching off into the horizon. Michelle types out a heated response in the text box and doesn’t think to take a different route to avoid the four men loitering until it’s too late, until she unfortunately makes eye contact—it’s a snarling glare to their cat calling—and she tries to make a detour, a shortcut to a main street by speeding around the corner and down a short alley near a pizzeria. She doesn’t remember that the men were the same who tried to follow her to Peter’s apartment over a month ago—but one remembers her, faintly, but still.

“It’s the makeup,” he explains, smugly, along with the expensive watch he grabs from her wrist to inspect and that he’s seen a glimpse of her on tv.

There’s four of them in total standing at different distances from her.

Michelle takes a swing with her umbrella to the one holding her wrist, hitting him across the face. He staggers, shocked, and she takes the chance to ram the handle of her umbrella into his groin before sprinting down the narrow strip of sidewalk between the buildings. The thundering of footsteps behind her make her pulse jump into her throat. Her purse and plastic Jimmy John’s bag swing at her side. There’s still some distance between reaching the other to the public when she’s yanked back by her purse and the strap pops, her shoulders forced to the wall, and the remaining men surround her. One sneers, snatches her luxury purse. Another holds her still as her jewelry and belongings are stolen. She still hasn’t pressed _Send _on her message to an employee.

Michelle tries to fight, is outnumbered, overpowered. She screams.

Then there's a flash of action, of flurry movement and punches. For Michelle, it feels like time slows in those few moments: first, the four men crowd around her, and then one is grimacing on the ground, two webbed to a wall, the fourth's feet are webbed to the ground. A few passerby on the main street stop and turn; one pulls out a cellphone to dial.

A red figure leaps down from the building's roof.

Heart pounding and hypocritical, never has Michelle been both relieved and un-reacting to see an unenthusiastic Spider-Man give the address to the woman on the phone with a 911 operator, him shooting an extra round of artificial webbing around the thieves for the police to apprehend. He then gathers Michelle’s dropped belongings to place them in her shaking hands, apologizing about her smashed sandwich. He sounds exhausted, she notices. He's making small talk about missing the robbers due to helping the black-suited Spider-Man and going on about _interns_ and being out of the superhero business for years but he isn't necessarily _back still_ but was helping other heroes.

Michelle deposits her stolen watch, bracelet, broach, and broken necklace he's handed into her purse. This red-suit Spider-Man then apologizes about the crack across her phone’s screen, tells that it's luckily still usable and doesn't necessarily need to be replaced _yet_, and is preparing to inform her that the pizzeria right next door has a crap rating and has the food to match and it isn't a good place to look for immediate productive help _either—_then he looks at her face.

And he stops.

Michelle watches intently. She imagines his furiously, _distractingly __dumbfounded_ stare right beneath the layer of his mask.

He gives a surprised sigh of, “Michelle…?” And then he pauses, and she's glaring now. “I didn’t…”

“You didn’t expect me, but someone else, right?” Her arms cross over her chest. “Go on. Laugh.” She steels herself against his silent stare and through her still-rattled nerves. She shuffles her purse higher on her shoulder as she moves to leave, intent on preserving her _pride_. “Sorry to _disappoint_ you.”

“No, that’s not—!” He holds out an arm to stop her from leaving but she effortlessly walks around him. So, Spider-Man barricades her path with himself.

His oculars don’t blink and she finds it kind of unsettling; she imagines him still having that _obnoxious _wide-eyed look as the silence hangs, expectant as well as empty.

Michelle watches, expectant; hair slightly frizzed from humidity and her recent activity.

Glancing around at the growing number of onlookers, Spider-Man mumbles, “Can we talk?”

Still stubborn, she huffs, shuffles on her feet. “What is there to talk about?” It's stated in a way that doesn't initiate an answer.

What she expects is for him to get the idea that there was nothing, that everything was left in place back nearly two months ago. She expects him to nod or leave and they never speak again.

What she _doesn’t_ expect is, at the sounds of approaching police sirens, to be scooped up and swung onto a nearby building top with him. What she _also_ doesn’t expect is for him to pull off his mask and go on a five minute tangent of broken sentences involving terribly mustered gusto, confusion, anger, and _emotion _that she most definitely _doesn’t have time _to hear. Correction: she doesn't have the _emotional readiness_ to hear it, not yet over her own feelings about their breakup. This is all too much, too many apologies and explanations and open-ended questions, and Michelle doesn’t want to _feel bad_ about it anymore.

It’s all too much.

What she also isn't prepared for is to be featured on a YouTube video days later, the camera footage grainy and too far for the figures to be distinguishable, but Michelle _knows _it’s her.

She's shocked to be in a video titled ‘Woman saved by Spider-Man then attacks him.’ She watches the video with a dry mouth as the video maker’s comments vanish and pop up in semi-translucent caption bubbles on screen: they comment about her dreary looks, about Michelle hitting Spider-Man in the arms repeatedly with her large muted-pink purse, about him grabbing her arm and forcing her purse to their feet, and then about him pulling her close by the waist before the video abruptly ends.

Michelle sits and stares.

She has a bad feeling about this.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _**IMPORTANT MESSAGE!** So now there is one more chapter until all of the ceo main verse chapters have been re-uploaded! But that isn't where this all ends_
> 
> _There is another verse set to take place after this chapter, think of it as a AU of this AU maybe? In this other verse, there are completely different adversity factored into their post-breakup and overall relationship, one where their "two" (as a couple) become three. This AU verse is conveniently titled the "Watson-Parker verse."_
> 
> _But I have not decided whether to post it exclusively on Tumblr or to make the CEO AU into a series and post the Watson-Parker verse as a new story with links. I'm still trying to decide on what to do. (Also there are four verses in total.)_
> 
> _**Please** don't be shy about sending me messages on my Tumblr or leaving comments on AO3. If you need anything or want to know anything else, feel free to ask!_


	15. The one where Peter's jealous over the newest addition to the work team

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Chapter prompt: 3 sentence spideychelle prompt: Expressing jealousy**
> 
> **Chapter prompt: Question that came about from your last 'jealousy' post! Was Peter any sort of jealous when he first saw Mark and Michelle interacting in your ceo au or more curious about who he was to Michelle? pleaseeeeee tell us**
> 
> **Chapter prompt: three sentence fic (ceo au): peter gives Michelle his notice about leaving as her assistant**
> 
> **Chapter prompt: Three sentence prompt: Peter sees Michelle and Mark together.******

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hi hello bonjour wonderful readers! here is the last re-upload to the main verse of this ceo au! this means that now, all the chapters I posted on my deleted blog are now here and all on ao3. yay!
> 
> I hope you enjoy this chapter <3

Expressing jealousy isn’t something Michelle does _well_—she's tightly-clenched jaw, curled lips, and glares that incinerate from feet away and feel to sharpen with every side eye; she's empty optimism that grows increasingly bitter with every lie, every fake-smile, and she eventually gets to a point with all this where the passive aggressiveness becomes as transparent as a brick wall until the final straw and then she just doesn’t show up, distancing and ostracizing herself.

The first time it happens was in Junior year of high school: she was practically dragged off to the side and away from the small semicircle of laughing friends in order for Peter to question her—_the audacity_, she'd thought then—about why she’s been deliberately avoiding him during their school-funded trip abroad, like it wasn’t made _prominently clear _of his interests with the new student, _Gwen _fucking _Stacy_.

(She hadn't known him then; she hadn't even _liked_ him in high school. Correction: she knew _of_ him but she didn't _know_ him then, so there was little reason to _like_ Peter in high school. But she knew who Gwen was, and younger Michelle had been a more jealous Michelle. And if asked now, years later, Michelle couldn't remember.)

Likewise, because of his blatant displays of adoration towards Gwen and his inability to pick up _clues_ and the most basic of hints, which resulted in his _missed chances _following that abroad trip, Peter has no place to complain when he’s introduced to Gwen's steady boyfriend years later and in college. He has no place so he settles on draping an arm around her waist or her shoulders and reminding how long they’ve been friends and as many times as he can, and he _“lets slip” _his strength during handshakes or any physical contact to her boyfriend, and he unintentionally remembers little facts Gwen mentions that her boyfriend doesn’t remember, making him look bad, and Peter’s always lying—this perpetuates into his life even these many years later with Michelle where it's all repeating again.

Peter lies and he's less clueless now but just as hesitant; he still second-guesses, double and triple checks and has anxiety-ridden pep-talks to himself. He holds secrets and tells half-truths, partial truths, has paranoia that makes him cover his tracks and interests and anything that can label him as a n_ormal human being_ and not an _entity_; he lies and smiles to Michelle, draping an arm around her shoulders and then around her waist and lets the thrill of prop wedding rings get to his head and eventually his emotions.

He lies to her face, twisting the truth—Peter lies so much that he’s caught off guard when Michelle corners him in the kitchen of her condo home and demands to know _“_W_hat the hell is his problem; why are you lying to my face so much?”_

Bad habits are hard to break—both know this; he and Michelle can take a page from this: jealousy, drinking, lying. Both of them are hypocrites.

* * *

* * *

First impressions are a necessary evil required to perform any level of one's running jumpstart into any form of relationship, and first impressions should be handled delicately and seriously.

Peter’s always been a bit clunky at first impressions and first meetings.

Likewise, how one conducts themselves around specific persons when receiving certain information is equally important. This too, Peter could have done better.

It’s a crisp, clear day in early November when it happens and things turn for the worse than they already are: 

Peter Parker is three weeks from his personally pre-scheduled date of termination when Michelle J. Watson strides out of her office, past his assistant/receptionist desk, not even _glancing_ his way, and greets the tall man who has been waiting for her for the past twenty-six minutes and whom Peter has been _steaming_ over in jealousy.

The man—who Peter knows _vaguely _through word-of-mouth, and who goes by the nickname “Golden Thumb” from relations on his resume and his work history to financially improve businesses—stands tall and reflexively puts a hand on the flap of his suit's jacket, the brass buttons shining and matching his designer cufflinks. Mark Raxton is his name overheard during their introduction, followed by his sickly-sweet flattery towards Cedill's CEO.

Michelle outstretches her hand in introduction, and Mark shakes it firmly before quickly kissing the back of her hand.

Several feet away, Peter scowls at this, his nose wrinkling and growing hot under the collar for negative reasons.

Michelle isn’t very impressed by the act herself but withholds an eye roll until her back is turned and they're walking back to her office—although she doesn't roll her eyes, her small grin diminishes then hardens to Mark's face at his actions.

Peter's glare darts from watching the pair from the corner of his eye then to a point in the wall as he appears to have been busy, waiting for them to approach.

He hasn’t moved from his desk since Michelle exited her office to greet Mark, the stack of papers in his hands frozen from movement. His pulse drums in his ears.

As she approaches Peter's desk, Michelle chuckles honestly at Mark's joke and then flattery and Peter’s jaw tightens, the papers crinkling in his hands.

As she holds the door open to her office, Mark is laying the compliments on _thick_. As they leave pass Peter’s desk, Mark has the _audacity _to give Peter an excited _thumbs up_, but Peter only gives a tight-lipped, flat smile in return. As soon as Mark turns, Peter is frowning again; mentally, he kicks himself for even reacting to Mark.

The meeting between the CEO and her new employee isn’t sudden, and Peter has had a good two weeks in preparation but he still hadn’t expected the man to be the _way_ he is—he's as skilled and creditable and attractive as his Rolex and glossy shoes, and his _face._

A woman walking by does a double take at Mark, pauses when he smiles at the CEO, and then mouths to Peter “_Is that the new guy!?”_

Peter grinds his teeth instead of replying.

Although he's had time to prepare and arrange his new schedule to accommodate their newest arrival, he still feels a punch to his confidence and at the hope of he and Michelle ever getting back together—a feat he was really grasping onto following his planned termination and some of the perpetrators of the scandal being on trial. At least, he had a _plan_ before she _finalized_ their relationship's end. More specifically, before _Mark Raxton_ was brought into the picture.

Peter can't help but eavesdrop from his desk and overhears Mark crack a joke and Michelle’s laugh filtering out into the hall right as her door closes.

Peter’s head falls into his hands, feeling as if hell is freezing over.

He’s pulled from his self-indulging by Catherine Wells, an employee working on the same floor, who approaches his desk with a morose expression.

“I talked with Greg and I thought to come over and see how you were doing.”

Confused, Peter asks what she meant by that and what Greg told her, Peter never having much one-on-one conversation with Greg before but knowledgeable about Greg's passive aggressiveness and tendency to stretch the truth.

“He’s noticed you’ve been pretty down lately. Like, for the past couple weeks,” Catherine answers. “Since... Since, you know, you and _the CEO_...”

Peter inwardly starts to panic. “Wh-what do you mean _me and the CEO?_”

“You had a _crush_ on her and she _rejected_ you, didn’t she?” Catherine has never known much about verbal filters, Peter's reminded. “Isn’t that what happened? That’s what Greg told me.”

Peter sighs.

It _had been_ rumored that Peter and the CEO were an _item_, but luckily not everyone seems to believe it, Catherine included. When asked about it, she simply stated that the couple would be _too farfetched to ever happen_. The wound to Peter's confidence as he overheard her will never be known but he's reminded of it today.

“Yeah. Yeah, that’s what happened,” Peter lies, looking down to the wooden pencil he's twisting between both hands.

“I’m so sorry.” She rests an apologetic hand on his shoulder. “You're a great catch. And I'm sure you'll find someone worthwhile. And someone you can date in the workplace.”

Peter's returning grin is forced and dry.

* * *

Months ago, it was broadcasted that Michelle J. Watson _apparently _had close relations with her personal assistant but those rumors were successfully put to rest. Some still seem to believe it—those who believe it are mostly others who work in the company building, working closest with the aforementioned pair. Catherine has remained one of them but only privately.

Now it's years later and it’s a personal hell on Earth when Peter finds out Mark will be working close to the CEO, becoming a member of her personal team. And Peter _thinks _he manages a controlled face during the meeting involving him, Jasmine (Michelle’s second in command), and all the heads of the local departments. Peter _thinks so_ but his grip tells otherwise.

The icing on this shit-cake is when Mark thinks it is a _great idea _to revel loudly about his newly gained job’s position, how he’s the absolute best at it and can’t be beat, about how closely he’s working with the CEO and the opportunity, and talking as if all in the room have known each other for more than the three weeks he’s been employed.

During one of Mark's boastings when he happens to be alone with Peter, in an explosive impulse, Peter snaps at Mark: “Don’t act like you know her! You have only been here for a few weeks!” 

There's an attempt to deflect it but Mark fails.

“I’ve worked here and with her for _years_,” Peter adds, jealousy making his nerves run. “She isn’t what you think she is. And next time, don’t use the same _corny_ lines from _freshman_ year in college.”

It successfully drives an end to Mark’s gloating but after the incident and during their next team meeting, Michelle periodically glances toward Peter with _suspicion_.

Peter doesn’t like how _confident _Mark is about his place beside the CEO—even though Mark's position is temporary, until earnings are back up. Specifically, Peter doesn’t like Mark's _fawning_ and _obedient behavior_ or how Mark waits on her every whim.

And it isn’t even that it’s _Mark _but Peter’s afraid of the _impact_—because Michelle is intelligent, independent, and indescribably spectacular. And Mark’s...

Well, Mark is the exact kind of tall, dark skinned, and handsome that makes Peter’s eyes roll, makes him suspicious, makes him sneer and bristle and defensive. It makes him _worry_—about his notability, about his authority, security, about his _relationship_ and _significance_ in Michelle’s life.

It has _everything_ to do with Mark.

* * *

Throughout the next week it is absolute hell.

When Peter is in the same room as both Michelle and Mark, there’s a defensive _shift _in his posture, a _sharpness _in his eyes, a tad more _sting _lacing Peter’s words, and extra strength in his handshakes. And he sidesteps a little closer to Michelle when Mark criticizes or answers with sarcasm. In privacy, Peter gives sarcastic or knowingly _wrong _advice when asked. All the while, Peter avoids directly facing Michelle while trying to talk with her in order to ask to reconsider the status of their relationship, the end driven by fear of safety and suspicion of trust and truth.

* * *

The candles added to this already undesirable cake is Michelle confronting Peter the following week.

Through strained painted lips, she simply tells that she knows Peter has been hostile towards their newest member but she isn’t going to ask _why_ because she already suspects the correct answer. She doesn’t _want_ to interact more than necessary in fear of things failing to be _professional_ once again.

Peter denies that he’s been hostile towards Mark Raxon.

Michelle objects, retelling the events of how Peter has recently become absolutely _no help_ to quoting Mark's questions which Peter purposely sabotaged, but Peter doing an award-winning job when _she _asks him the same questions.

Peter denies further but Michelle sees through his jealous bullshit and tells he can’t pick sides, that work is a team effort.

He’s never been on a side, he tells.

“Don’t bullshit me, Peter. We’re not discussing that. Not here, not now.” Because of this, she's going to make an excuse to leave her office again in order to clear her head, he knows.

“I’ve always been on _your_ side. With _everything_.”

“No, no more, alright? Don’t do this again,” her voice noticeably cracks before she orders him out.

To a levelheaded person, Mark wouldn’t pose much of a threat, supposedly. But because Michelle and Peter have been together for _years_, a new face in the fresh wake of their break up wouldn’t throw a wrench in their plans.

Not a _large _wrench, it’s hoped.

But noticing the increasing amounts of time Mark and Michelle are spending together increases worry from Peter. He’s self-conscious and second-guessing everything and he’s... He’s not doing well.

When he’s leaving the office late one night, he miraculously leaves _at the same time_ as Michelle is, and has the opportunity to discuss the overhanging cloud of emotions felt and left unsaid. But before he can, he’s phoned by his journalism boss with a confirmation to terminate his assistant job under the CEO.

He never truly talks about it with Michelle.

* * *

* * *

It's now three weeks later and the dreaded end has come.

Jasmine informs her first, of course, hearing the news drifting on the wind and vibes that screamed louder than her morning alarm. The news next came from Mark, Michelle's newest employee whose job is to work closely beside her (and who unintentionally caused much jealousy), spoken as a roll-off-the-shoulder comment before Michelle gets the notice herself—which appears on her desk two days later, typed out on yellowed resume paper._ Something _about all of this, she just _doesn’t like_; something about all this just doesn’t feel _right_ to her.

So, late one night Michelle approaches Peter's desk conveniently at the time he’s finished packing his things for the day. His desk is nearly empty now, having emptying it a little each day, she assumes. He can’t even look her in the eyes.

“I know you’re leaving, but...” Each word drops heavily in the empty space, naturally echoing off the walls but reverberating in a place deeper within herself.

She’s answered with a partial whisper, partially rushed, “Yeah—uh—everything’s finished here so there’s no reason for me to _stay_.”

She impulsively follows it with: “No reason…that’s not true, Peter.”

* * *

* * *

Peter inadvertently, unexpectedly sees Michelle with Mark approximately two months and eleven days after their split—but not like he's counting, certainly not—while out on a late evening, using a coverage of a political speech at town hall as an excuse to avoid his persistent neighbor, Ursula, and her overcooked homemade cookies that are always _too sweet _for his taste buds but Peter never has the heart to tell her.

On this two month and thirtieth day mark, Peter is heartstrings and terribly shielding himself in the freezing mid-heavy rain, doing his best to ignore the water soaking through the newspapers over his head, and all his energy having been drained and his mood _plummets _along with his heart to his shoes as he catches Michelle standing across the busy street, outside in the rain with arms around herself, dressed in a little black dress, and then Mark comes rushing outside with an umbrella he shields her with.

Even though he’s sure neither sees him between the speeding cars and trucks, Peter watches from afar as Mark leads Michelle to an awaiting Lyft, opens the door for her, and doesn’t wait until she’s fully inside or having closed the door before he’s dashing to the other passenger seat and getting inside himself.

Peter is certain neither sees him, but that just makes the pain _that_ much worse.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> just a few things: 
> 
> 1\. like it said in the note at the beginning, all the chapters are now here. but this certainly isn't the end. at all. I promise. well, as long as you all want it to keep going.
> 
> 2\. remember, this fic is fueled by prompts I receive to my Tumblr and if you want to see more chapters - whether it is about certain characters, about something that has happened between current chapters or about events not yet touched on, or the future in this au - if you want to see anything more at all, send in a prompt!
> 
> 3\. this is all that was written for the MAIN verse of the ceo au, but there are four verses that were touched on before my deleting: the main verse, a "meet the parents" verse, a more nsfw secret relationship verse (currently on my Tumblr), and the "watson-parker" verse
> 
> 4\. that last one is going to be posted as a separate story here on ao3. all of the ceo fic will be combined into a series to avoid confusion
> 
> 5\. stay tuned for the posting of that verse!
> 
> 6\. again, if you want more of any of the verses, if you have questions or want to come scream at me, [message me on Tumblr](http://parallelmarvel.tumblr.com/ask)
> 
> 7\. I hope you all have liked this so far

**Author's Note:**

> Leave a comment on ao3 if you like this! Reblog on Tumblr to spread the word and love!
> 
> Send a prompt to my Tumblr if you want to see more chapters (leaving comments is also motivation that will help get more chapters out)


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